Trading basics

What is derivatives trading? Derivatives trading refers to the agreement between a buyer and a seller to trade a certain asset at a specified price and quantity at a certain time in the future. More specifically, derivatives trading in crypto refers to futures trading based on crypto assets, like expiry futures or perpetual futures.

What are Crypto Derivatives and Why Do They Matter? Cryptocurrency derivatives are financial instruments that derive their value from an underlying crypto asset, such as Bitcoin or Ethereum. Instead of directly buying or selling the asset itself, traders use these contracts to speculate on its future price, manage portfolio risk, or enhance trading strategies. For beginners, crypto derivatives might seem complex, but they offer powerful tools for gaining exposure to digital assets — without actually owning them.

Perpetual futures are a type of cryptocurrency derivative . While perpetual futures are very similar to expiry futures, they differ in two significant ways: Expiry Where expiry futures have expiry dates set in advance, perpetual futures don’t, meaning buyers and sellers can hypothetically keep their positions open 'perpetually' — as long as their account holds enough margin to cover losses and prevent liquidations.

OKX offers both crypto-margined and U-margined (USDT-margined and USDC-margined) futures products. They're different in terms of: Quote currency One important difference is the quote currency, which affects the price index of crypto-margined vs. U-margined pairs. For example, a U-margined BTC/USDT perpetual futures uses the price of OKX spot BTC converted to USDT. Meanwhile, a crypto-margined BTC/USD perpetual futures uses the price of OKX spot BTC converted to USD.

OKX Quick Margin offers the most powerful and intuitive margin trading experience in crypto. Here’s how it works. Before diving in the specifics of the product, we’ll cover briefly what margin trading