Learn From International Experience To Establish And Improve The Oil Futures Market

Oil is the "blood" of modern industry. With the further fast process of industrialization, we import more and more oil from abroad year by year. The sudden rise and sharp fall in the world oil price has brought more effects on the stable growth of our economy. Besides the growth rate of GDP and balance of payment, it effects on many other aspects. Therefore the researches on how to evade the risk of oil price fluctuation and ensure the healthy development of country economy by oil futures are significant.Future market is an advanced form which is derived from spot market, and is also a necessary outcome of commodity economy's development. The major functions of it are hedge and price discovery. Future market develops with the risk evasion on various commodities. The first oil future contract was made in NYMEX in 1978. Then the oil futures grew faster and faster. There are more and more oil futures. Nowadays, there are many famous oil futures exchanges all over the world which promote the development of oil trade and provide the risk evasion tools for the oil futures participants. As a result, the optimal choice of establishing and improving our oil futures market is using the experience of international oil futures for reference.In china, futures market develops rapid in recent years, and various commodity futures which are out-of-order in the 20th century step into the right path now. In addition, Shanghai Petroleum Exchange sets up onl8th Aug, 2006 which indicates the canonical development of our oil futures trade. In the 1st chapter, I will introduce the general situation of futures market, and expatiate on the functions of hedge and price discovery. In the 2nd chapter, I will present the foreign oil futures market's history and some important oil futures exchanges such as NYXEM, then analyze their successful conditions and experience. In the 3rd chapter, I will investigate China's oil supply safety condition and the effects on our economy brought by the sudden rise and sharp fall in the world oil price, and summarize the difficulties and experience which block the development of our oil futures market. I will give some suggestions and countermeasures in the 4th chapter. For the sake of improving China oil futures market, we should break monopoly in oil market, reform the system of petroleum business enterprise and the Chinese Oil Pricing Mechanism, and strengthen the risk management of oil futures. I also give some suggestions on how to design the oil futures contract in an order of fuel-gasoline-crude oil and where we can set up the new petroleum futures exchange in this thesis.