NAS100, US100, USTEC and NDX100 are broker labels for the same underlying thing: a contract for difference on the Nasdaq 100 index, which tracks the largest non-financial companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange. The ticker changes between brokers. The behaviour does not.
Two features define how it trades. The index is capitalisation-weighted, so a handful of very large technology companies dominate the number, and it carries far more directional energy per session than a major currency pair. Both of those facts have to be reflected in your position size before anything else matters.
You are trading a concentrated bet, not a diversified one
The name says one hundred companies. The weighting says something else. Because the index weights by market capitalisation, the top handful of names carry a disproportionate share of the move, and a single earnings report from one of them can shift the whole index by more than a percent in after-hours trade. Anyone who bought NAS100 expecting broad exposure to the American economy is actually holding a concentrated position in a few very large technology balance sheets, plus a rates view attached to them.
That rates view is the second layer. Long-duration growth companies are sensitive to the discount rate applied to earnings far in the future, so the index reacts to bond yields with more force than a broad market index does. An inflation print that moves the front end of the yield curve will move NAS100 before it moves anything else on your watchlist. The same mechanism that connects real yields to gold connects them to tech valuations, running in the opposite direction.
Cash CFD and futures are different products
Most retail brokers quote a cash index CFD. It tracks the spot index, it has no expiry, and it stays open until you close it. To reproduce the economics of holding the underlying shares, the broker applies a daily financing adjustment to open positions, which is the index equivalent of a swap charge on a currency pair. Hold a long position for six weeks and that adjustment becomes a real line item.
The futures contract works differently. It expires on a set date, its price already contains the cost of carry to that date, and the exchange fixes the contract size. Nothing is debited nightly, but you have to roll before expiry and the roll has its own cost. Some brokers offer both and label them almost identically, so read the instrument name carefully. A trader who thinks they are in a cash CFD and is actually in an expiring contract gets a surprise at settlement.
Contract size is the number that ends accounts
Here is the sizing conversation I have had more times than any other. A trader used to EURUSD opens NAS100 at one lot because one lot is what they always trade. On a major pair, one standard lot means roughly ten units of account currency per pip. On many NAS100 contracts, one lot means one unit per index point, and the index routinely travels two hundred points in a session. The trader has quietly gone from a familiar risk to a multiple of it.
The fix is arithmetic, done before the first trade. Read the contract specification in the platform. Confirm the value of one point for one lot. Decide the distance in points your stop needs to sit, based on the instrument's actual daily range rather than a habit borrowed from currencies. Then work backwards to the lot size that puts your loss at your fixed risk per trade. The mechanics are the same as any other instrument; the numbers are not. Position sizing in lots covers the general method, and it should be re-run for every index you add.
Never carry a lot size across instruments. The same one lot can mean a 50 unit loss on one contract and a 2,000 unit loss on another. Size is an output of the stop distance and the point value, never an input you keep constant out of habit.
The clock that matters
NAS100 has three distinct personalities during the day, and knowing which one you are in prevents a lot of pointless trades.
| Window (New York time) | What is happening | Typical character |
|---|---|---|
| Overnight into 08:00 | Futures track Asian and European risk sentiment | Thinner, drifting, prone to false breaks |
| 08:30 | Scheduled US data releases | Immediate repricing, wide spreads for a few minutes |
| 09:30 to 11:00 | US cash equity open, real volume arrives | The largest and cleanest ranges of the day |
| 11:30 to 13:30 | Lunchtime lull | Range compression, stop hunting in both directions |
| 14:00 on policy days | Central bank decision and press conference | Two-way violence, direction often reverses twice |
| 15:00 to 16:00 | Closing auction flows build | Trend acceleration or sharp reversal into the close |
The cash open is where most of the index's daily range is created, which is why so many index strategies are built around the first ninety minutes. Outside that window, the same setups produce smaller moves against the same spread, and the arithmetic of risk to reward quietly turns against you.
Gaps, breaks and the overnight problem
The instrument stops quoting for a short daily maintenance break, and it is closed over the weekend. Positions held across either can reopen at a different price than the one where trading stopped. A stop order does not protect you across a gap; it becomes a market order at the first available price on the other side. If you hold index positions over the weekend, treat the stop as an intention rather than a guarantee, and size for the possibility that the gap is larger than your planned loss.
Earnings season adds a scheduled version of the same risk. When one of the very large constituents reports after the US close, the futures reprice immediately while you are away from the screen. Traders running index positions through earnings weeks either reduce size or stay flat over the specific dates. That is a preference, not a rule, but a large adverse gap creates the kind of drawdown that takes months of ordinary trading to repair.
What tends to work, and what tends not to
NAS100 trends hard and reverses hard, which rewards traders who let winners run and punishes traders who fade strength on a hunch. Momentum continuation after a decisive cash-open break has been a durable behaviour of the instrument for years. Mean reversion works too, but only against a volatility measure rather than a feeling about how far is too far.
What does not work is trading it at currency-pair size with currency-pair stop distances. A 20 point stop on an index that moves 20 points while you are typing the order is not a tight stop, it is a donation. If your account cannot support a stop wide enough to survive normal noise at the smallest available lot size, the correct conclusion is that the instrument is too large for the account, not that the stop should be tightened. Index CFDs are leveraged products and carry a high risk of loss. There is more on the wider family in the indices trading guide.
"Every trader who blew up on an index told me the same thing first: they used their normal lot size. Normal is a property of the contract, not of you."
— Alex Onta, Executive Director, SINGUARD
Key Takeaways
- NAS100 is a concentrated position in a few very large technology names plus a bond yield view.
- Read the point value in the contract specification before the first trade, then size backwards from the stop.
- Cash CFDs carry a nightly financing adjustment; futures embed it in the price and expire instead.
- Most of the daily range forms in the first ninety minutes of the US cash session.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is one point worth on NAS100?
It depends entirely on your broker's contract specification, which is why you must read it before your first trade. A common arrangement is that one standard lot moves the profit and loss by one unit of account currency per index point, so a 100 point move on one lot is 100 units. Other brokers scale the contract differently. Open the instrument specification in your platform, place a minimum size trade, and confirm the number against a known price move before you size anything up.
Is the NAS100 CFD the same as Nasdaq 100 futures?
No. A cash index CFD tracks the spot index and has no expiry, so the broker charges or pays a daily financing adjustment to replicate the cost of carry. A futures contract has a fixed expiry, a price that already embeds financing until that date, and a standardised size set by the exchange. The two prices track each other closely but they are not identical, and rollover mechanics differ.
Why did my NAS100 stop get hit overnight when the market was closed?
The underlying index is only calculated during the US cash session, but the futures that price the CFD trade for most of the 24 hour cycle. Your position stays live while you sleep, and news from Asia or Europe can move it. There is also a daily break during which the instrument does not quote, and prices can reopen away from where they stopped, which means a stop can execute at a worse level than the one you set. Stop placement should account for that.