Clearing
Also written Clearing process · Trade clearing
The daily accounting step that reconciles what every party owes and is owed on its open and closed positions, and turns a day of trades into one net obligation per member.
In plain language
A trade is not finished when it is matched. Between the match and the money there is a step that nobody sees, and that step is clearing.
Clearing works out the arithmetic. It takes every trade a member did today, every position carried in from yesterday, every mark-to-market gain and loss, and every margin already lodged, and reduces the whole pile to a single number: pay this much in, or expect this much out, tomorrow morning.
Settlement is the money actually moving. Clearing is deciding how much has to move. The workbook keeps the two apart and so should you.
How it works
Automated at every exchange, the cycle runs three times a day around the trading session.
Pre-trading: member margin limits are uploaded to the trading system, and the obligation and margin file is uploaded to the clearing bank. Margins are verified. These files already fold in commodity futures, options on futures, options on goods and index futures together.
Intra-trading: funds collected against margins and obligations are tracked, open position limit utilisation is monitored, and members' requests to increase or release margin are processed.
Post-trading: clearing members' positions are computed from open interest at the client level, trades are processed, reports are generated, margins and MIS are updated, and pay-in and pay-out instructions are issued.
After the session, members download files over FTP carrying the day's transactions, positions carried forward, the closing position and the net obligation report — which itself shows margin deposit, margin utilised, available deposit, the pay-in or pay-out due, and transaction fees payable or receivable.
Every clearing member holds two accounts with a clearing bank: a settlement account and a client account. All debit and credit instructions are effected in the settlement account.
A worked example
The workbook's own two-member example, priced out.
Clearing members A and B. X is a client of A; Y is a client of B. X buys one gold futures contract — lot 1 kilogram — from Y at Rs 50,000 per 10 grams.
Contract value = 100 units of 10 g x Rs 50,000 = Rs 50,00,000
Margin at 5%, blocked from BOTH X and Y = Rs 2,50,000 each
The margin is blocked in real time from the clearing member, who in turn blocks it from the client. Nobody has paid anybody yet.
At the end of the day the closing price is Rs 50,100 per 10 grams.
| Position | Move | MTM | |
|---|---|---|---|
| X (long, via A) | Bought at 50,000 | +Rs 100 per 10 g | +Rs 10,000 |
| Y (short, via B) | Sold at 50,000 | +Rs 100 per 10 g | −Rs 10,000 |
Y pays in Rs 10,000 on T+1; X receives exactly that Rs 10,000 on T+1. The clearing corporation is not a source of funds — it is a conduit. On any day, across the whole exchange, the MTM losses collected equal the MTM gains paid out.
Repeat this every day until expiry, and the accumulated MTM has already moved the entire price difference. Which is why, at delivery, the bill is raised at the Final Settlement Price and not at the traded price: the gap was settled long ago.
Why NISM asks about it
Chapter 7 (Clearing, Settlement and Risk Management), sections 7.1 and 7.2. Expect definition questions separating clearing from settlement, the pre/intra/post-trading checklist, and the two-account rule — a settlement account and a client account, with all instructions hitting the settlement account.
Common exam traps
- Clearing is the accounting; settlement is the transfer. A question describing "matching the outstanding buy and sell instructions and transferring ownership against funds" is describing settlement.
- The clearing corporation is not the exchange. Both are governed by the SECC Regulations, 2012, but the entity that guarantees settlement is the clearing corporation.
- MTM is netted at the member level, but positions are computed from open interest at the client level. Getting the level wrong produces the wrong number.
- Margins are blocked on both sides of a trade, not just on the side that is losing.
- Pay-in and pay-out of MTM happen on T+1, before trading starts. If MTM is not collected in time, the exchange scales initial margin up by a factor of the square root of two.
- All debits and credits go through the settlement account, not the client account.
Where this is taught
Free preparation for NISM Series XVIRelated terms
- NovationThe clearing corporation stepping into the middle of every trade — becoming the buyer to every seller and the seller to every buyer — so that neither side carries the other's default risk.
- Clearing corporationThe entity that steps between every buyer and seller in the derivatives segment by novation, becoming the counterparty to both sides and guaranteeing that the trade settles.
- Daily Settlement PriceThe price at which every open futures position is marked and reset at the end of each day — the last 30 minutes' volume weighted average price of that contract, computed separately for each expiry.
- Mark to MarketThe daily settlement of a futures position at that day's closing price, so gains and losses are paid in cash every evening instead of accumulating until expiry.
- SettlementThe step where the obligations computed by clearing are actually discharged — commodities against funds on a delivery-versus-payment basis, or cash against the settlement price.