Retender

  

Categories: Banking

We just love futures. Not the tea-leaves-and-crystal-balls kind of futures, though those are, um...neat in their own right...but the investing-in-commodities kind of futures. And, hands down, our favorite commodity is corn. But just because we like investing in corn futures, that doesn’t mean we necessarily want to take delivery of a shipping container full of corn when we buy a corn futures contract. Seriously, what would we do with all that corn? Which is why it’s so great that retenders exist.

Usually, we can just sell a long futures contract before it expires and avoid the whole physical-delivery issue altogether. But if we don’t sell before that magical date, we’ll receive a notice of delivery, which means the corn is...coming. A “retender” happens when we sell the delivery notice for the underlying asset tied to our futures contract. In plain English, this means that we don’t have to take physical possession of the corn because we’ve sold the actual corn delivery to someone else. Which is good, because we’re pretty sure our HOA has rules against having huge crates of corn in our driveway.

Related or Semi-related Video

Econ: What is Legal Tender?0 Views

00:00

And finance Allah shmoop what is legal tender and no

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it's not an official great of meat like this Filet

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is legally tender but I still can't cut it And

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it's not the name of a magazine that will get

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you on an FBI watch list if you subscribe to

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it either Legal tender refers to money like the dollars

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and cents you have in your pocket that's legal tender

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the actual bills and coins that allow you to buy

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stuff Yeah that's legal Tender legal tender is a medium

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of exchange that's been recognized by the government as thie

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acceptable form of payment in that jurisdiction and old by

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the way it's recognized by the people who accept it

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as payment as well First medium of exchange While this

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term refers to something that everyone accept is a form

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of payment it's medium right It's shared by everybody kind

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of in the middle It allows an economy to move

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past the bartering stage of just trading beaver pelts for

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bottles of Coke Think money of course but also think

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gold or wampum or cigarettes in an old prison movie

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Everyone recognizes value and so will trade goods and services

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For the item It's a way to transfer in store

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value so legal tender is a kind of medium of

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exchange The legally accepted form of exchange right Those dollar

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bills are the legally accepted form Well the government has

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said In our country this will be the medium of

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exchange So in the US it's dollars in the you

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It's the euro In the UK it's the pound in

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South Africa it's the rand and so on So you're

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on a cruise ship that sinks way out in the

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ocean You and some of the other vacationers wash up

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on a desert island Everyone starts doing different jobs One

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guy build shelters out of palm leaves and you know

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some sticky stuff He scrapes off of rocks Other people

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fish or catch crabs You know the crabs you could

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eat You make a delicious drink out of coconut milk

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honey and the fermented juice from a weird orange berry

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you found growing in a cave At first people trade

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things by barter This works but well only up to

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a point To trade your coconut drink for food you

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need to find a fisherman who wants some of what

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you've got to offer If no one with fish wants

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cocoa drink today Well no fish for you Well eventually

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people start stringing seashells together to make special necklaces These

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necklaces get traded for anything you want Now every time

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you give someone your drink well you get a string

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of shells You can then use the shelves to buy

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fish It's no longer necessary to find someone with fish

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who wants some cocoa Drink you Khun Sell the drink

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to the shelter builder for a set of shells and

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then use those shells to buy fish Right So what's

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happened here The shells have become the medium of exchange

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there The currency of the island Well after a while

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you give up hope of rescue You decided to form

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your own country You elect leaders Build yourself a palm

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tree and rock blue Ah Parliament house First act turned

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the strings of sea shells into official currency You make

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them legal tender Well the island government now Khun regulate

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the number of shell strings that get made the same

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way The Federal Reserve in the Treasury Department print currency

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and regulate the dollars that circulate through the economy You've

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been selling out of coconut and you've built up quite

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a pile of shells there You're getting rich Now if

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you get rescued first step after a shower Of course

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Check the foreign currency exchange market for the shell string

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two dollar exchange rate and hope it's a good one

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Yeah Don't do it right at the airport Wait till

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you get into town You get a way Better deal

Up Next

Finance: What is a tender offer?
5 Views

A tender offer occurs when the government, or a large corporation, "tenderly" asks for bids, and then investors, uh... do their bidding.

Find other enlightening terms in Shmoop Finance Genius Bar(f)