NASDAQSIGNALS Which market has actually closed?
Nasdaq's published schedule, checked on 6 September 2026, lists the regular share session as 9:30 a.m.–4 p.m. Eastern Time on normal trading days. It also lists pre-market and after-hours sessions. Those extended sessions are share trading outside regular hours; they are not the same instrument as an index future or a CFD.
CME describes NQ futures as providing nearly 24-hour access. “Nearly” matters: a futures market has breaks, holidays and contract-specific arrangements. A broker's NAS100 dealing hours and pricing policy are a third schedule.
Four labels that should not be mixed
| Label | What you are looking at |
|---|---|
| Nasdaq-listed share | An individual company's equity, possibly trading in an extended session. |
| Nasdaq-100 cash index | An index reference, not an order you can execute directly. |
| NQ future | An exchange-traded Nasdaq-100 futures contract with its own delivery month. |
| NAS100 / US100 CFD | A broker-defined derivative quote and contract. |
An after-hours earnings announcement can therefore reach active shares and futures after the regular session has ended. A moving NAS100 screen does not prove that the cash index is updating in the same way, or that all constituent shares are trading at those implied levels.
A 100-point gap is not automatically a 100-point move
Illustrative prices, not current market data. Imagine a displayed cash-index close of 20,000 and a futures quote of 20,100 later in the evening. Subtracting the two gives 100 points, but it mixes different instruments and observation times.
If that same futures contract was already at 20,080 when the regular session ended, its measured change is only 20 points: 20,100 minus 20,080. The remaining 80 points were already present in the cross-instrument comparison. A clean event comparison uses the same contract, quote source and starting timestamp.
How to read the next opening move
Keep the prior regular-session close separate from overnight highs and lows. Label a futures level with its contract month; label a broker quote with its symbol. When comparing a news event, state the observation window instead of simply calling everything “the overnight Nasdaq move.”
Nasdaq notes that extended-hours share trading can have lower liquidity and greater volatility. That is a reason to identify the session in an analysis, not a claim that every after-hours move will reverse at the open.
The NQ guide below covers point values and instrument differences. For the app's actual supported market and store availability, use the product page; an explanation of NQ mechanics does not extend a NAS100 product's coverage to futures.