Futures are concentrated in futures exchanges and traded through standardized contracts. Some futures contracts can be traded through OTC, which is called OTC contract. According to the types of subject matter, futures can be divided into commodity futures and financial futures.
In ancient China, there was a commodity credit and forward contract system consisting of grain warehouses and grain markets. During the Republic of China, there were many futures exchanges in China and Shanghai, and the market was once crazy. The Manchukuo government also set up futures exchanges in Dalian, Yingkou, Fengtian and other northeast 15 cities, mainly engaged in soybean, bean cake and soybean oil futures trade. 1949 after the founding of People's Republic of China (PRC), the futures exchange disappeared in Chinese mainland for decades. At 1992, Zhengzhou established a futures exchange, which set off another wave of futures speculation, and many provinces and cities blossomed. At most, more than 50 futures exchanges opened at the same time, exceeding the sum of futures exchanges in other countries in the world. In 1994 and 1998, China the State Council strengthened supervision twice, suspended some futures products and ordered some exchanges to stop business. Since 1998, there are only three legal commodity futures exchanges in Chinese mainland: Shanghai Futures Exchange, Dalian Futures Exchange and Zhengzhou Futures Exchange. The former is engaged in energy and metal commodity futures trading, while the latter two are engaged in agricultural product futures trading. On September 8, 2006, China Financial Futures Exchange was established in Shanghai, and the first product launched was the Shanghai and Shenzhen 300 stock index futures.