Price Limit (Limit Up, Limit Down): How Futures Daily Limits Work, With CME's Current Numbers

Michael Whitman · Trading since 2017, full-time since 2020 · YouTube creator, 137K subscribers · Published 2026-09-14 · Updated 2026-11-02 · Reviewed 2026-11-01

A price limit is the largest move a futures contract is allowed to make in one trading session, set by the exchange as a fixed distance above and below the previous day’s settlement price. On CME Group’s price-limits page as of trade date 19 Oct 2026, corn’s limit was $0.30 a bushel either way.

Reaching the top of the band is called limit up, and the bottom limit down. What happens next depends on the contract: some markets freeze at the line, some pause and widen, and none of them make the reason for the move go away. CME resets grain limits twice a year, and the next reset took effect on trade date 2 Nov 2026.

How it works

The band starts from yesterday’s settlement. Add the limit to the settlement price for the ceiling and subtract it for the floor. If corn settled at $5.00 with a $0.30 limit, no trade can print above $5.30 or below $4.70 that session.

Trades outside the band are not allowed, but orders can be. CME’s course on price limits says traders can still place good-til-canceled or good-til-date orders outside the band, and those orders fill only if the limits move far enough to reach them.

Each product family has its own rule. On the CME page:

Grain limits sit still; dynamic ones move with the market. A corn limit is one number for the whole session. For the agricultural products the same page lists on dynamic circuit breakers, the range resets on a rolling 60-minute window, and a 10% move inside that window starts a 2-minute halt instead of a lock for the day.

Limit up and limit down in stock index futures

The levels match the stock market’s circuit breakers. CME says its US equity index limits are designed to coordinate with the NYSE rules, which halt stock trading when the S&P 500 falls 7% (Level 1) or 13% (Level 2) before 3:25 p.m. Eastern, and close it for the day at 20% (Level 3). The circuit breakers page covers the stock side in full.

The futures timetable is different from the stock one. The 7%, 13% and 20% downside limits apply from 8:30 a.m. to 2:25 p.m. Central; from 2:25 to 3:00 p.m. only the 20% limit applies; and overnight, from 5:00 p.m. to 8:30 a.m. Central, there is a 7% limit both up and down.

The page lists the levels in index points. For the December 2026 E-mini S&P 500 (ESZ6) it showed a reference price of 7,704.00, an overnight band of 8,240.00 to 7,168.00, a 13% level of 6,708.50 and a 20% level of 6,172.25. Those point widths (536.00, 995.50 and 1,531.75) are 6.96%, 12.92% and 19.88% of the 7,704.00 shown, not exactly 7%, 13% and 20% of it; CME’s rule sets how the levels are calculated.

Single stocks have their own band. Under the Limit Up/Limit Down plan, an S&P 500 stock above $3.00 trades inside a 5% band around its average price of the last five minutes, and a stock stuck at the band for 15 seconds pauses for five minutes.

A worked example

December 2026 corn on 9 Oct 2026, from Yahoo’s daily bars. Corn is quoted in cents per bushel and one contract is 5,000 bushels (CBOT rule 10102.B).

Step 1, the band. The previous close was 500.25 cents, or $5.0025. With the $0.30 limit, the floor was $5.0025 - $0.30 = $4.7025 and the ceiling $5.3025.

Step 2, what the market did. The session’s low was exactly $4.7025, the floor, and the close was $4.7975, down $0.205.

Step 3, the money. On one contract the close-to-close fall was 5,000 x $0.205 = $1,025. Had it settled at the floor, the fall would have been 5,000 x $0.30 = $1,500, the most one session allows.

Step 4, what a second day could add. CME’s grain FAQ says expanded limits, about 50% higher, start when a contract month among the first five to eight listed non-spot months settles at the limit. For corn that is the $0.45 on the page, or $2,250 a contract. Two locked sessions in a row could therefore cost $1,500 + $2,250 = $3,750 per contract before the holder could trade at all.

One caveat on the data. Yahoo’s close is not always the exchange’s official settlement, so “touched the limit” holds only if the previous close shown equals that day’s settlement.

The original data

We measured every December 2026 corn session from 1 May to 30 Oct 2026, the six months one limit setting covers, against the $0.30 limit. Archived copies of CME’s page show $0.30 for both trade date 18 May 2026 and trade date 19 Oct 2026. The chart shows each session’s close minus the previous close.

No session closed a full limit away. Of 127 sessions, the largest rise was 20.25 cents (12 Aug 2026) and the largest fall 21.25 cents (30 Sep 2026). Six sessions, 4.72% of the 127, moved 15 cents or more, half the limit, and the median move was 4.5 cents. As a share of price, the 30-cent limit was 6.00% of the 500.25-cent close before 9 Oct, and the largest fall was 4.07% of the close before it.

One session reached the line intraday. On 9 Oct 2026 the low sat exactly 30 cents under the previous close, the worked example above, and the close recovered to 20.5 cents down.

That fits what CME itself says. Its course notes that agricultural futures go limit up or down more often than equity index futures, which very rarely do, and that wider limits in recent years have made back-to-back limit days less common. A limit is built for the rare session, not the ordinary one.

The full series is published. Every session is in the corn limit table, with the daily high and low measured against the previous close as well.

How limits are set and reset

Grain limits are recalculated twice a year. CME’s grain and oilseed FAQ says settlement prices are averaged over 45 days before each reset and multiplied by a set percentage, 7% for corn, and the new limit starts on the first trade date of May or November. The archived CBOT corn rule adds the detail: round to the nearest 5 cents, with a 20-cent minimum.

The 7% was chosen from history. CME says the percentages were set by looking at past daily price changes so that the limit would cover daily moves 99% of the time. The 127 sessions above, none of which closed a full limit away, sit inside that design.

So the limit tracks the price level. A higher corn price produces a wider limit in cents, keeping it near 7% of the price; at $4.29 a bushel, 7% is about $0.30.

Check the current rule before relying on it. The $0.30 on this page is CME’s figure as of trade date 19 Oct 2026. The November reset took effect on trade date 2 Nov 2026, so the corn limit in force today may differ; CME’s price-limits page shows the current number.

Not every contract month carries a limit. In grains the spot month has none, limits come off the business day before first notice day of an expiring month, and options on grain futures have no price limits at all, according to the same FAQ.

Price limit vs limit price

A price limit belongs to the exchange; a limit price belongs to you. A limit price is the worst price you will accept on your own limit order. It changes nothing for anyone else.

A price limit binds every trader in that contract at once. Nobody opts out, and in a locked market even a market order waits, because there is no trade to fill it against.

Questions people ask

What does limit up and limit down mean in futures?

Limit up means the contract has risen by the full daily limit above the previous settlement; limit down means it has fallen by the full limit. In a hard-limit market such as corn, no trade can happen beyond that price for the rest of the session.

What happens when a futures contract hits limit down?

Trading can continue at or inside the band, but sellers who want a lower price get no fill. Depending on the contract, the market may pause and widen (stock index futures), halt for two minutes (products on dynamic circuit breakers), or stay at the limit until the next session (grains).

How are price limits calculated?

Each exchange sets its own method. CBOT corn uses 7% of a 45-day average price, reset each May and November; CME’s stock index limits are percentages turned into index points.

Do stocks have price limits?

Not a daily limit like futures. US stocks have the Limit Up/Limit Down bands around a five-minute average and the market-wide circuit breaker halts at 7%, 13% and 20%.

When it fails

The classic failure is a stop order that cannot fill. A trader holds a long corn position with a stop order 25 cents below the last settlement. News breaks overnight, the market opens and locks at the 30-cent floor, and every seller is queued at the same price with no buyers. The stop is triggered but fills only if someone buys at the limit, so the loss can carry into the next session with the band reset lower again.

The second is reading a lock as a price. The last trade at the limit is not what the contract is worth; it is the furthest the rule allowed it to go. The real value may be well beyond the band, and the next open can gap straight to the new limit.

The third is sizing as if the exit is always open. Position sizing from a stop distance assumes the stop fills near its price. With leverage, two locked sessions at $1,500 and $2,250 a contract can exceed the margin on the account before any order executes.

The fourth is trusting an old number. Limits reset on a schedule and after limit days, so the figure in last month’s notes, or on this page, may not be the one in force today.

Related

Limit price covers the order instruction with the almost identical name. Market order explains why even the most urgent order waits in a locked market, and liquidity covers what disappears at the band. Futures covers the contracts these limits apply to.

This page is educational, not financial advice. Test every idea on your own charts before risking money.