Forex Speculators Pushed USD Bullish Positions Higher For 2nd Week
Zachary Storella | Dec 04, 2016 01:19AM 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 increased their bullish bets in favor of the US dollar last week for a second consecutive week.
Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large speculators, had an overall US dollar long position totaling $24.82 billion as of Tuesday November 29th, according to the latest data from the CFTC and dollar amount calculations by Reuters. This was a weekly rise of $2.57 billion from the $22.25 billion total long 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 US dollar bullish positions have been on a remarkable run with speculator positions gaining for nine out of the past ten weeks and now currently standing at their highest level since January 19th 2016 when aggregate bullish positions equaled $25.03 billion.
Weekly Speculator Contract Changes:
The major currency that improved against the US dollar last week was just the euro (+108 weekly change in contracts).
The currencies whose speculative bets declined last week versus the dollar were the Japanese yen (-11,169 contracts), Australian dollar (-9,748 contracts), Mexican peso (-6,186 contracts), British pound sterling (-3,817 contracts), Swiss franc (-1,434 contracts), New Zealand dollar (-1,339 contracts) and the Canadian dollar (-1,114 contracts).
Table of Weekly Commercial Traders and Speculators Levels & Changes:
h3 Weekly Charts: Large Trader Weekly Positions vs Price/h3This latest COT data is through Tuesday and shows a quick view of how large speculators or non-commercials (for-profit traders) as well as the commercial traders (hedgers and traders for business purposes) were positioned in the futures markets. All currency positions are in direct relation to the US dollar where, for example, a bet for the euro is a bet that the euro will rise versus the dollar while a bet against the euro will be a bet that the dollar will gain versus the euro.
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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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