Contracts and the roll in ATAS X
Learning objectives
- Read a futures contract code such as NQZ6 and name the contract month and year it stands for.
- Pick the dated contract in every ATAS X chart, and say when a continuous chart is safe to read and when it is not.
- Spot the jump an unadjusted continuous chart shows at the roll, and explain why it is a contract switch, not a market move.
- Run a roll-week check so that your ATAS X charts, your suite workspace, your option levels and your TopstepX order ticket all sit on the same contract.
Thursday 10 September 2026, 10:00 ET (21:00 ICT). Two screens on our lab’s desk both said “NQ”. One read 29,100.50 on the September contract, eight days from expiry; the other had moved to the December contract near 29,336.05. Nothing was broken.
A level drawn on one contract and traded on the other would have been 235 points off. This lesson shows you how to choose the contract on purpose in ATAS X, switch every screen together, and recognise the “gap” that is not a market move.
Key terms
Contract month (tháng đáo hạn của hợp đồng): NQ, ES and their micro versions MNQ and MES are each listed as four contracts a year, expiring in March, June, September and December Definition. Each is its own market with its own price.
Contract code (mã hợp đồng): symbol, month letter, year digit. H March, M June, U September, Z December: NQZ6 is the December 2026 E-mini Nasdaq-100 Definition. Your feed may spell it NQZ26 or NQ DEC26; the parts are the same.
Front month (hợp đồng tháng gần): the contract where most of the trading happens.
Roll (chuyển kỳ hạn): traders move positions from the expiring contract to the next, so volume migrates over a few sessions Definition.
Continuous contract (hợp đồng liên tục): a chart that stitches front months into one history. Unadjusted, it shows each contract’s real prices and jumps on the switch day. Back-adjusted (điều chỉnh lùi), it shifts older history by the jump so the line is smooth, but those older prices never traded Definition.
Term you need: carry. The next contract trades above the expiring one by about three months of interest minus dividends on the index. M0.08 shows the arithmetic; on NQ in September 2026 it was about 230 points. MKT1.02 goes deeper into expiry and the roll.
Chart first: the gap that is not a gap
Roll week on one chart: volume moves, the price line jumps
DefinitionNQHow it works
Which contract am I looking at?
Every price, footprint cell and order belongs to exactly one contract. Two charts that both say “NQ” can be on different months, and then their prices differ by the carry, not by anything the market did Definition.
CME publishes the calendar. NQ and ES stop trading at 09:30 ET on the third Friday of the contract month and settle to a special opening print of the index that morning Definition. CME also publishes a roll date, conventionally the Thursday eight days before expiry: for December 2026, Thursday 10 December, with expiry on Friday 18 December. Check CME’s roll calendar each quarter.
Volume decides the front month
Trade the contract with the volume: that is where the book is deep and the footprint means something. Around the roll date, daily volume crosses to the new month. Which day that happens on NQ is not yet measured in our lab; the drill has you read it off your own charts.
Desk habit: once the next contract has more volume for a full session, switch every screen to it the same day House rule.
The continuous chart
A continuous chart is handy for history: a weekly profile needs more than one contract. How it switches decides what you see.
- Unadjusted: the line jumps by the spread on the switch day. A VWAP or volume profile spanning the switch mixes two markets and shows an empty zone where nothing traded.
- Back-adjusted: smooth, but an old high on the chart is not a price anyone traded.
Our lab’s knowledge base of ATAS X lists a Continuous contract and three rollover types: Expiration Date, which follows the exchange’s expiry calendar, and two volume-based ones. It lists no back-adjustment setting, so treat your ATAS continuous chart as unadjusted until you have checked a roll day yourself.
Myth / hypothesis: “The roll jump on a continuous chart is a gap, and price comes back to fill it.” Lore Nobody traded inside that jump: it is two contracts drawn on one line. There is nothing to fill.
What the data says
Worked example: switching on Tuesday 15 September 2026
Illustrative levels, real spread. At 10:00 ET (21:00 ICT) the September contract trades 29,135.75 and the December contract about 29,366.00, so the spread is +230.25 to the nearest tick.
Last night you drew a buy zone at 29,050.00 on your September chart, the prior day’s value area low. Today you move to December.
- Read the spread at one moment. Both last prices from the same second: 29,366.00 − 29,135.75 = 230.25.
- Move the level. 29,050.00 + 230.25 = 29,280.25 on December. Tag it “shifted from U6”.
- Rebuild what you can. After the first full December session, draw prior-day high, low and value from December’s own data and delete the shifted copies.
- Price the mistake. 230.25 points is 921 ticks: $4,605 per NQ contract, $460.50 per MNQ.
The mirror and the failure
The short side. A sell zone at 29,200.00 on the September chart becomes 29,430.25 on December.
The failure. Suppose you forget, and type 29,200.00 into a December sell limit. December trades near 29,366, so the limit is below the market: it is marketable and fills at once, near 29,366 Definition. You are short in the middle of nowhere, with a stop built for a level that is not there. The long side fails the other way: a December buy limit at 29,050 rests 300 points under the market and never fills. The trap reverses when the chart is on December and the ticket on September.
Do it on the platform
Prop-firm note. On a Topstep account your orders, fills and loss limits live in TopstepX, on the firm’s data (PLAT2.08). An order on the wrong month is still your order. We have no dated rule card yet on how the firm handles expiring contracts, so check the help center before the roll.
Common mistake
Common mistake: Reading the roll jump as a market event: a gap to fill, a breakout, or a new high in a backtest. Counting it as evidence gives you a base rate for something that never traded.
Drill: find the roll on your own charts
Use the September 2026 roll (or December 2026, from Thursday 10 December).
- Open two daily NQ charts in ATAS X: the expiring contract and the next one. Cover the ten sessions around the roll date.
- Write each day’s volume for both. Mark the first day the next contract has more.
- At one moment on that day, read both last prices and compute the spread.
- Open a continuous NQ chart and find its switch day. Does it match your crossover day? Is there a jump the size of your spread?
- Check your option levels’ contract and your order platform’s contract.
Solution
You should end with four numbers: the crossover day, the spread (about 230 points in September 2026), the continuous chart’s switch day and its jump. If the switch day differs from your crossover, its rollover type follows another rule: note it, and trade only the dated contract. A jump about the size of the spread means the chart is unadjusted. Our lab has not yet measured the crossover day across many rolls, so your notes are your own data.
Recap
- Every price, level and order belongs to one contract month: H March, M June, U September, Z December, plus a year digit.
- Switch every screen to the new month on the same day, once it has the volume.
- An unadjusted continuous chart jumps by the spread at the roll; back-adjusted, its older prices never traded.
- Shift a level by the spread read at one moment, tag it, and rebuild it from the new contract’s own data.
- In roll week, check four places: ATAS X charts, the suite workspace, the option levels’ contract and the TopstepX ticket.
Further reading
- CME Group, E-mini Nasdaq-100 contract specifications, cmegroup.com: listed months, last trading day and final settlement.
- CME Group, E-mini S&P 500 contract specifications, cmegroup.com. Check both, and CME’s roll calendar, each quarter.
- M0.08 Basis & fair value: why the next contract sits above the expiring one.
- Our lab: an options-data feed and a futures feed sat on different NQ contracts for four sessions in September 2026, about 230 points apart.
Prerequisites: M0.08 Basis & fair value · PLAT2.01 Install ATAS X and connect a data feed · Next: PLAT2.03 Chart types and loading history. With the right contract on every chart, the next step is choosing how its trades are grouped into bars and how much history to load.
Educational content only. Not financial advice. Futures trading involves substantial risk of loss.
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