Currency Speculators Sharply Decreased Us Dollar Bearish Positions This Week
Zachary Storella | Feb 18, 2018 04:51AM 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 reduced their bearish bets for the US dollar this week.
Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large speculators, had an overall US dollar net position totaling $-8.19 billion as of Tuesday February 13th, according to the latest data from the CFTC and dollar amount calculations by Reuters. This was a weekly rise of $4.74 billion from the $-12.93 billion total position that was registered the previous week, according to the Reuters calculation (totals of the US dollar contracts against the combined contracts of the euro, British pound, Japanese yen, Australian dollar, Canadian dollar and the Swiss franc).
The aggregate speculative position saw the largest weekly rise since December 19th when the weekly change was $5.63 billion and fell under the $-10.0 billion level for the first time in four weeks.
Weekly Speculator Contract Changes:
This week saw two substantial change (+ or – 10,000 contracts) in the individual currency contracts for the speculator category.
The British pound positions fell by over -12,000 bets this week and declined for a third straight week. The overall bullish level for the GBP is at the lowest level since December 26th when net positions totaled +12,676 contracts.
The Euro speculative positions dropped by -13,534 net contracts this week and decreased for a second straight week. Euro bets were at a record high bullish level two week’s ago at +148,742 net contracts.
Overall, the major currencies that improved against the US dollar this week were the Swiss franc (316 weekly change in contracts) and the Mexican peso (3,923 contracts).
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The currencies whose speculative bets declined this week versus the dollar were the euro (-13,534 weekly change in contracts), British pound sterling (-12,927 contracts), Japanese yen (-2,633 contracts), Canadian dollar (-7,635 contracts), Australian dollar (-4,667 contracts) and the New Zealand dollar (-1,112 contracts).
Table of Weekly Commercial Traders and Speculators Levels & Changes:
EuroFX:
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.
(The charts overlay the forex closing price of each Tuesday when COT trader positions are reported for each corresponding spot currency pair.) See more information and explanation on the weekly COT report from the CFTC website.
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