The gap between a futures price and the index it settles against. It exists because holding a position to the settlement date has a cost, it narrows as expiry approaches, and it is ordinary rather than informative. Its practical consequence on this desk is that a futures price and an index level are compared as CHANGES and never subtracted from one another.
Mayawhat these words mean
Maya reads the desk’s written explainers and the glossary. She holds no market data at all, so she can say what a thing is and cannot say what it is doing today.