Futures Industry Association - FIA

Once a year, in a mystical and magical location (like Middle Earth or Las Vegas), swamis, séance-givers, and crystal ball makers all converge to trade stories, improve techniques, and market their wares. Sometimes, they predict things with such accuracy that they’re astounded by their own skill. And sometimes, their meeting location coincides with that of the Futures Industry Association, or FIA.

Anyway, the FIA, despite what its name might suggest, is not a coalition of clairvoyants. It’s a not-for-profit group made up of all kinds of folks associated with the world of futures trading. We’re talking brokers, merchants, financial institutions…the whole gang. The FIA platform allows them to all band together to do important things like reduce trade costs, lobby Congress for futures-friendly regulations, educate members on rules and ethics, and induct the who’s who of futures into their very own Futures Hall of Fame. (We’re serious...there’s a Hall of Fame. They announce every year’s inductees at their annual conference in Boca Raton. Lovely place. Just ask the psychics.)

The FIA is also all about making the futures world fairer, more transparent, and less susceptible to fraud. All good things. It was established in New York back in 1955, but now has offices all over the world in exotic places like Brussels and Singapore.

Maybe we should ask the swamis who the next Futures Hall of Fame inductees might be.