1 es contract = ~100k
initial margin for 1 es contract = around 2.5k
so you're paying 2.5k of your cash to play with 100k on margin
you would need 50k cash to buy 100k worth of SPY on margin usually, so you can see that futures allow you to do more with less
i'm conflicted that ES will make lower lows this year
i see a possibility after a pullback into 1900s that ES will launch to 2300+ and that would be wave 5 followed by a 50%+ crash, kinda like in the 1920s but who knows