Futures Expirations

Expiration dates determine when trading in a given contract month ceases, which directly affects how Continuous futures series are constructed, when volume shifts to the back month, and where rollover gaps appear. Different futures products follow different expiration rules: some expire on the third Friday of the contract month, others use a formula tied to the 25th calendar day of the prior month, and a few follow entirely unique schedules. This article groups all 82 contracts Kibot carries by their expiration method and provides pre-calculated expiration dates through 2030.

Expiration Methods by Contract Group

Third Friday, Equity Index Futures

Contracts: ES, NQ, YM, RTY, EMD, NKD, NIY, NN, MES, MNQ, QO, QI, YK, YC, YW, XAE, XAF, XAI, XAK, XAP, XAU, XAV, XAY, XAB.

Trading expires at 9:30 AM Eastern on the third Friday of the contract month. The Kibot Faq confirms this: "Expiration is at 9:30 am ET (New York) time zone on the third Friday of the delivery month" (per Kibot's Historical Futures FAQ). These contracts are cash settled using a Special Opening Quotation (SOQ) calculated from the opening prices of each index component on expiration morning. This is colloquially known as "triple witching" or "quad witching" when equity index futures, index options, stock options, and single-stock futures all expire on the same day.

VIX Special Settlement

Contract: VX.

VIX futures expire 30 calendar days before the third Friday of the month following the contract month. This typically falls on a Wednesday. Settlement is cash based, calculated from the opening prices of a specific strip of SPX options on the morning of expiration. Because of the "month following" rule, a January VX contract does not expire in January, it expires in mid-to-late January, 30 days before the third Friday of February.

Currency Standard

Contracts: EU, BP, JY, CD, AD, SF, NE, PX, BR, RP, RY, RF, M6E, M6A, M6B, MCD, MSF, ME, JE, SIR, RA, SEK, AJY, PJY, ECD, EAD.

Trading terminates 2 business days before the third Wednesday of the contract month. The exception is the Canadian Dollar (CD and MCD), where trading terminates 1 business day before the third Wednesday. Physical delivery applies to the major pairs; some cross-rate and E-micro contracts are cash settled.

Business Day Before the 25th, Energy Futures

Contracts: CL, NG, HO, RB, QM, QG, BZ.

Trading terminates 3 business days before the 25th calendar day of the month preceding the delivery month. If the 25th is not a business day, trading terminates 3 business days before the last business day preceding the 25th. For example, a March Crude Oil contract (CLH) stops trading in late February. NYMEX energy contracts are physically delivered, with the exception of BZ which is cash settled against ICE Brent.

Business Day Before the 15th, Grains and Metals

Contracts: C, W, S, O, BO, SM, RR, GC, SI, HG, PL, PA, MGC, SIL.

For grains (C, W, S, O, BO, SM, RR), trading terminates on the business day before the 15th calendar day of the contract month. These contracts are physically deliverable against warehouse receipts. For metals (GC, SI, HG, PL, PA, MGC, SIL), trading terminates on the third-to-last business day of the delivery month. Gold and Silver have specific delivery months (February, April, June, August, October, December), while Copper trades all 12 months.

Last Business Day, Treasuries and Live Cattle

Contracts: TY, FV, TU, US, UB, TN, FF, LE.

For the 10-year, 30-year, Ultra bond, and Ultra 10-year treasuries (TY, US, UB, TN), trading ceases 7 business days before the last business day of the delivery month. These are physically delivered via the Federal Reserve book-entry system. The 2-Year and 5-Year Notes (TU, FV) cease trading on the last business day of the calendar month. Fed Funds (FF) terminates on the last business day of the delivery month and is cash settled against the average daily effective federal funds rate. Live Cattle (LE) terminates on the last business day of the contract month at 12:00 PM Central Time and is physically delivered.

Last Friday, Bitcoin

Contract: BTC.

Trading terminates at 4:00 PM London time on the last Friday of the contract month. If the last Friday is not a business day, expiration moves to the prior business day. Cash settled against the CME CF Bitcoin Reference Rate (BRR), which aggregates trade data from multiple cryptocurrency exchanges.

Custom Schedules

Pre-Calculated Expiration Dates: 2024–2030

Third Fridays, Equity Index Quarterly Expirations (March, June, September, December)

These dates apply to ES, NQ, YM, RTY, and all other equity index contracts that expire on the third Friday.

VIX Futures Expirations, All Months, 2025–2030

VIX expirations fall 30 calendar days before the third Friday of the following month. These dates are notoriously tricky to compute by hand; use the table as a reference.

Expiration and Kibot Data

When a front-month contract expires, continuous contract data must transition, or "roll", to the next active contract month. The timing of this rollover has a significant effect on the data series. Roll too early and you miss the final days of high-liquidity trading; roll too late and you are capturing a contract with rapidly declining volume and widening spreads. Kibot constructs continuous contracts using the clearly defined per-contract offsets documented in Futures specifications and on the Futures rollover rules page.

Several volume and liquidity patterns are worth knowing. Front-month volume typically peaks 2–5 days before expiration, then drops sharply as traders roll their positions to the next contract month. Back-month contracts begin attracting significant volume 5–10 days before the front month expires; for heavily traded products like ES and CL, the back month may become more liquid than the front month several days before expiration. Quarterly contracts (equity indices, treasuries, currencies) have well-defined roll windows, while monthly contracts (energies, VIX) require more frequent attention. Expiration-day volatility is common, particularly for equity index futures during the SOQ calculation window, if analysis is sensitive to outlier moves, consider how expiration-day data points affect results.

Key Takeaways

• All 82 Kibot futures contracts fall into roughly eight expiration-rule groups, from third-Friday cash settlement to last-Thursday cash settlement (Feeder Cattle).
• Equity index contracts expire at 9:30 AM ET on the third Friday of the contract month and are settled via SOQ.
• VIX (VX) is the notable exception to the "third Friday of the contract month" pattern: it expires 30 calendar days before the third Friday of the following month.
• Energy futures expire three business days before the 25th of the prior calendar month, a March contract stops trading in late February.
• Pre-computed expiration tables through 2030 are provided for third-Friday and VIX contracts.
• Rollover timing in Continuous futures series is a per-product offset from the expiration date defined here.

Related

• Continuous futures, How rollover timing interacts with the expiration calendar.
• Futures specifications, Per-contract rollover offsets and trading months.
• Market holidays, Holidays that can shift effective expiration or early-close behavior.
• Futures symbols, Month codes used to identify each expiring contract.
• Trading hours, Session boundaries that frame expiration-day activity.