Currency Speculators Edged US Dollar Bullish Positions Higher Last Week
Zachary Storella | Feb 26, 2017 02:58AM ET
The latest data for the weekly Commitment of Traders (COT) report, released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday, showed that large traders and currency speculators pushed their bullish bets for the U.S. dollar just a touch higher last week following six weeks of decline.
Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large speculators, had an overall U.S. dollar long position totaling $15.02 billion as of Tuesday February 21st, according to the latest data from the CFTC and dollar amount calculations by Reuters. This was a weekly rise of just $0.03 billion from the $14.99 billion total long position that was registered the previous week, according to the Reuters calculation (totals of the U.S. dollar contracts against the combined contracts of the euro, British pound, Japanese yen, Australian dollar, Canadian dollar and the Swiss franc).
The aggregate U.S. dollar speculative bets are now below the +$20 billion level for a fourth week in a row after staying above that level for the previous thirteen straight weeks through January 24th.
Weekly Speculator Contract Changes:
The major currencies that improved against the U.S. dollar last week were the Japanese yen (1,122 weekly change in contracts), Swiss franc (2,548 contracts), Canadian dollar (5,244 contracts), Australian dollar (9,304 contracts), New Zealand dollar (282 contracts) and the Mexican peso (3,732 contracts).
The currencies whose speculative bets declined last week versus the dollar were the euro (-11,487 weekly change in contracts) and the British pound sterling (-824 contracts).
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British Pound Sterling:
Japanese Yen:
Swiss Franc:
Canadian Dollar:
Australian Dollar:
New Zealand Dollar:
Mexican Peso:
*COT Report: The weekly commitment of traders report summarizes the total trader positions for open contracts in the futures trading markets. The CFTC categorizes trader positions according to commercial hedgers (traders who use futures contracts for hedging as part of the business), non-commercials (large traders who speculate to realize trading profits) and nonreportable traders (usually small traders/speculators). Find CFTC criteria here: (http://www.cftc.gov/MarketReports/CommitmentsofTraders/ExplanatoryNotes/index.htm ).
The Commitment of Traders report is published every Friday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and shows futures positions data that was reported as of the previous Tuesday (3 days behind).
Each currency contract is a quote for that currency directly against the U.S. dollar, a net short amount of contracts means that more speculators are betting that currency to fall against the dollar and a net long position expect that currency to rise versus the dollar.
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