Dec 27th - It's amazing, page-38

Futures products have a myriad of uses. Virtually any professional that trades stocks utilises futures products at some stage. Fund managers for example may hedge a portion of their portfolio if they expect a dip, rather than sell and buy back a basket of individual shares. Transaction costs are much lower, capital gains or losses are not triggered etc. Of course they track the underlying market. That’s what a derivative is. Whether they trade at a discount or premium is totally dependent on funding costs and any dividends payable up to expiry. Give or take a little bit it is formulaic. If it gets out of whack, arbitrage desks take advantage and bring it back to their formulaic calculation of fair value.