Hedging

A hedge is a futures position taken to offset the price risk of a physical contract: when you buy sugar at a fixed price, you sell sugar futures so a price fall doesn’t wipe out your margin. The broker who places the order replies with a fill: how many lots were done and at what price. The Hedging workflow follows that loop. A trader confirms a physical contract, Mercora prepares the hedge and the broker order, an operator approves it in the Inbox, and the broker’s fill is recorded against it. Mercora never sends an order to a broker without an operator’s click.

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How a hedge flows

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Set up hedging

A workspace admin sets this up once, under Settings → Integrations → WhatsApp. Before you start, Mercora’s WhatsApp number must be connected and added to the trader and broker groups (see WhatsApp), and, to log hedges in a sheet, Google Sheets connected (see Google Sheets).

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Route the WhatsApp groups

Under WhatsApp Group Routings, map each WhatsApp group that Mercora’s number is in to a role: Mercora reads only the groups you route. It posts in them only what you approve: the broker order and the thumbs-up.

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Add hedge rules

Under Commodity Hedge Rules, add one rule per origin keyword and book. A book here is a commodity on an exchange, such as white sugar in London. WhatsApp confirmations and API hedge requests are both planned from these rules. Each active rule also has Attach broker fills automatically, off by default:

• Off: fills wait on the hedge for you to record.
• On: a fill that answers this rule’s order and passes every check is attached without review, and the sheet row and booking follow. If more than one hedge could take it, it waits for you. Turn it on only if nobody else orders that contract in the broker group.

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Review a hedge plan

Open the hedge in the Inbox. The card shows the trader’s message, what the hedge is built from, and the broker order. The broker message is the order. Edit its text in the box if needed; the line under it explains how the lots were worked out. Under Also on approve, choose what happens alongside the order:

• Row appended to the hedge sheet tab, with lots and price blank until the fill.
• Thumbs-up on the trader’s message, so the trader sees it was handled.

Then decide: Some messages can’t become a hedge: no hedge rule matches, no broker group is set up, or the contract is already on another hedge. The card says which, and links the covering hedge.

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Record the fill

After the order goes out, the hedge waits for the broker. When a reply arrives in the broker group:

• With Attach broker fills automatically on and every check passed, the fill is attached on its own.
• Otherwise the hedge shows Fill captured · waiting on you. Click Attach to record it, or Dismiss — not this hedge’s fill.
• A fill Mercora couldn’t pair, for example because it arrived late, can be recorded with Enter this fill.

If the broker filled the order but no reply was captured, use Record the fill by hand. If the broker didn’t fill it, use Close without a recorded fill; the sheet row keeps its blank lots and price. A hedge whose order already went to the broker can’t be dismissed: it closes with a recorded fill or with Close without a recorded fill. A hedge still waiting long after its order went out is flagged No fill · overdue in Needs you. Once the fill is recorded:

• The hedge sheet row is completed with lots and price.
• If the Derivatives module is on, the fill is added to the futures ledger. See Derivatives.
• If your workspace pushes hedges to Agiblocks, the future is booked there and allocated to the rule’s position.

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Hedges in Agiblocks

Each booking step runs once. If one fails, the closed hedge shows Agiblocks failed in Needs you, with:

• Retry booking or Retry allocation. Mercora first checks Agiblocks for its own reference and won’t book or allocate twice. It only retries when you ask.
• Mark as handled, once you’ve dealt with it in Agiblocks yourself. Add an optional note. The failed attempt stays on record.

A booking reads Sent to Agiblocks · not yet confirmed until Mercora finds the future there. See External systems.

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Request a hedge from your own systems

Your own systems can ask for a hedge through the Mercora API:

• GET /hedge-books lists what your workspace can hedge: its active hedge rules.
• POST /hedge-requests asks for a hedge on a physical contract. It becomes a hedge in the Inbox for an operator to send. Nothing is sent to a broker from the API.
• GET /hedge-requests/{id} says where a request stands.

A hedge requested this way shows “Requested by” on its card, and has no trader message to thumbs-up. These calls need an API key with the hedge requests scope. See the API reference and API keys.

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Who can do what

If the Hedging module is turned off, the workflow stops and active hedges are hidden from the Inbox. See Roles and permissions.

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Next steps