11.   Speculators need to settle any outstanding April crude futures positions within the next two days in order to avoid delivery obligations once the contract expires.

12.   The market is volatile as brokerages jockey to bring the underlying index in line with their futures positions.

13.   Traders often try to influence the cash market by buying or selling heavily weighted stocks to minimize their losses or maximize profits according to their futures positions.

14.   Asian markets closed generally lower Wednesday, with share prices in Tokyo dropping as traders unwound futures positions and took profits following two sessions of gains.

15.   Observers said much of the stock buying was by dealers covering futures positions taken on expectations of a short-term decline.

16.   The administrators, from the international accounting firm Ernst and Young, said Wednesday morning that they had been closing out the Barings futures positions.

17.   Traders said the stock surge was caused by investors moving to hedge against short futures positions, which are essentially bets the stock market will go down.

18.   Traders said the surge was caused by investors moving to hedge against short futures positions, which are essentially bets the stock market will go down.

19.   After clearing all their futures positions, those institutions should be deprived of their memberships in the futures brokerages, it said.

20.   Also weighing on the market was selling to liquidate futures positions, they said.