Off-Exchange is a weekly aside on markets that barely trade, or do not exist at all. It sits outside the crypto, foreign exchange and commodities Levanter covers and scores, and carries no forecast.
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No. 5 2 October 2026
The price that was announced, not discovered
Almost every commodity worth money has a futures market. Diamonds, one of the most valuable things by weight on earth, have never sustained one. The reason is not that a…
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No. 4 25 September 2026
The future that lived two days
For a few days in the summer of 2010 you could have bought a future on a Hollywood blockbuster. Then Congress made it illegal, and box-office receipts took their place…
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No. 3 18 September 2026
There are no onion futures
America lets you trade a future on almost anything: oil, wheat, interest rates, even the weather. There are exactly two things it forbids by statute, and the first is…
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No. 2 11 September 2026
There is a market in the weather
Last week's column was about an asset no exchange will touch. This one is the opposite: a real, cleared, exchange-traded market in something you cannot hold, cannot…
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No. 1 5 September 2026
There are no whisky futures
A reader asked us whether anyone trades sake futures. Nobody does, and working out why turns into the most useful thing you can know about a whole category of assets…
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Off-Exchange is an editorial aside, separate from the crypto, foreign exchange and commodities Levanter covers and scores. Educational writing only, no forecast, not financial advice.