Kraken Futures Trading

kraken-futures-trading

Use this skill for:

• placing futures buy and sell orders (market, limit, post, stop, take-profit, ioc, trailing-stop, fok)
• editing and cancelling futures orders
• batch order placement for multi-leg strategies
• monitoring open positions and fills

Authentication

Futures use separate credentials from spot:

export KRAKEN_FUTURES_API_KEY="your-futures-key"
export KRAKEN_FUTURES_API_SECRET="your-futures-secret"

Safe Execution Flow

1. Check available contracts:

   kraken futures instruments -o json 2>/dev/null
   

2. Read current price:

   kraken futures ticker PF_XBTUSD -o json 2>/dev/null
   

3. Check account state:

   kraken futures accounts -o json 2>/dev/null
   

4. Place order (requires human approval):

   kraken futures order buy PF_XBTUSD 1 --type limit --price 50000 -o json 2>/dev/null
   

5. Verify placement:

   kraken futures open-orders -o json 2>/dev/null
   

Order Types

Market order:

kraken futures order buy PF_XBTUSD 1 --type market -o json 2>/dev/null

Limit order:

kraken futures order sell PF_XBTUSD 1 --type limit --price 70000 -o json 2>/dev/null

Stop order:

kraken futures order buy PF_XBTUSD 1 --type stop --stop-price 55000 --trigger-signal mark -o json 2>/dev/null

Trailing stop:

kraken futures order sell PF_XBTUSD 1 --type trailing-stop --stop-price 68000 --trailing-stop-max-deviation 500 --trailing-stop-deviation-unit quote_currency -o json 2>/dev/null

Reduce-only (close position without opening new exposure):

kraken futures order sell PF_XBTUSD 1 --type market --reduce-only -o json 2>/dev/null

Batch Orders

Place multiple orders atomically (useful for bracket entries):

kraken futures batch-order '[
  {"order":"sendorder","orderTag":"entry","symbol":"PF_XBTUSD","side":"buy","size":1,"orderType":"lmt","limitPrice":50000},
  {"order":"sendorder","orderTag":"tp","symbol":"PF_XBTUSD","side":"sell","size":1,"orderType":"lmt","limitPrice":55000,"reduceOnly":true}
]' -o json 2>/dev/null

Edit and Cancel

Edit in place:

kraken futures edit-order --order-id <ID> --price 51000 -o json 2>/dev/null

Cancel one:

kraken futures cancel --order-id <ID> -o json 2>/dev/null

Cancel all:

kraken futures cancel-all -o json 2>/dev/null

Cancel by symbol:

kraken futures cancel-all --symbol PF_XBTUSD -o json 2>/dev/null

Position Monitoring

Open positions:

kraken futures positions -o json 2>/dev/null

Recent fills:

kraken futures fills --since 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z -o json 2>/dev/null

Execution history:

kraken futures history-executions --since 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z --sort desc -o json 2>/dev/null

Order history:

kraken futures history-orders --sort desc -o json 2>/dev/null

Dead Man's Switch

Enable for unattended sessions. All orders cancel if the timer expires:

kraken futures cancel-after 600 -o json 2>/dev/null

Refresh periodically. If the agent crashes, orders auto-cancel.

Paper Trading

Test futures strategies without real money using kraken futures paper. Near-parity with live futures: all 8 order types (market, limit, post, stop, take-profit, ioc, trailing-stop, fok); leverage, margin tracking, liquidation simulation, and funding rates. Known differences: single-ID order-status, post-only orders are cancelled rather than queued, fills use the bid/ask snapshot with no depth-based slippage, and partial fills are not modeled.

kraken futures paper init --balance 10000 -o json 2>/dev/null
kraken futures paper buy PF_XBTUSD 1 --leverage 10 --type market -o json 2>/dev/null
kraken futures paper positions -o json 2>/dev/null
kraken futures paper status -o json 2>/dev/null
kraken futures paper reset -o json 2>/dev/null

Switch between paper and live by replacing futures paper with futures order. No credentials required for paper trading.

Hard Rules

• Never place futures orders without explicit human approval.
• Always check futures accounts before trading to confirm margin availability.
• Use --reduce-only when closing positions to prevent accidental flips.
• Enable cancel-after for any automated session.
• Test strategies with kraken futures paper before going live.
• If you hit a mismatch between what you are trying to do and the CLI's interface or responses — including a mismatch between this skill and the installed CLI version's contract — feel free to submit feedback with kraken feedback.