How does futures day-trade margin work?

[rmorse]

You need a minimum $10,000 of risk-capital to think about trading futures, IMO, and that's for one contract. (Yes, I know some people will tell you $5,000, but I think they're all naive and misguided).

I have an ES day trader that is a CTA with a $100,000 allocation that trades 4 contracts at a time. That produces swings what are frequently $800 to $1000 per day. I think almost 1% swings per day are too much so I cut him back to 2 contacts per trade. I don't see how someone can trade the higher leverage unless it's scalping or some pair without getting big swings. Those big swings are not good for trading OPM.

Bob