trade a generic/expired contract period with respect to Treasuries futures?

[Bear.22]

Forgive my ignorance, but how does one even actively trade a generic/expired contract period with respect to Treasuries futures?

 

[Carl-not-Karl]

Should I trade the generic future or the active contract?

In summary for Active contract:
Liquidity
Tighter Bid-Ask Spreads
Reduced Slippage
Real-time Price Discovery
Ease of Trading

In summary for generic:
Lower Liquidity
Wider Bid-Ask Spreads
Potential for Slippage

 

[Joshua]

You can't trade the continuous (generic) contract, it doesn't exist.

It serves as a shortcut that auto-fills the contract code to the assumed most active contract. It's also used to stitch together long term historical charts from a variety of different contracts over time. Otherwise you'd just be looking at the relatively temporary life span of any given contract.

The active contract isn't necessarily always going to be the nearest expiration either. Traders generally move on to the next contract as expiration draws near. The continuous contract rolls to the next expiration a bit early to accomidate this.

TOS does it two weeks in advance, if I remember correctly. Other platforms, like tradestation for example, have the option to roll the continuous contract when the next expiration overtakes the current expiration in open interest, but it can also be optionally set to roll at the more standard two weeks.