By CountingPips.com
The latest data for the weekly Commitments of Traders (COT) report, released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday, showed that large traders and speculators raised their overall US dollar bullish bets last week for the first time in eight weeks.
Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large International Monetary Market speculators, had an overall US dollar long position totaling $3.26 billion as of Tuesday April 1st, according to the latest data from the CFTC and calculations by Reuters. This was a weekly change of +$2.02 billion from the $1.24 billion total bullish position that was registered on March 25th, according to Reuters that totals the US dollar contracts against the combined contracts of the euro, British pound, Japanese yen, Australian dollar, Canadian dollar and the Swiss franc.
Individual Currencies – Large Speculator Weekly changes:
The non-commercial net positions for each of the individual currencies directly against the US dollar showed weekly gains for the British pound sterling, Australian dollar, New Zealand dollar and the Mexican peso while there were weekly declines for the euro, Japanese yen, Swiss franc and the Canadian dollar. See charts & data below.
Notable changes:
Euro large speculator positions fell last week for a second straight week to a net total of +33,238 contracts after rising to approximately a 5-month high of +52,991 contracts on March 18th. The data showed that long euro positions fell by -5,065 contracts while short positions rose by +1,331 contracts for a net change of -6,396 for euro contracts on the week.
Large moves for the week were registered in the Japanese yen positions which saw a weekly increase in bearish positions (-19,751) while there were notable weekly increases for the Australian dollar positions (+15,647) and the Mexican peso positions (+23,438).
* 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. Please see charts and data below.
Charts: Large Speculators Weekly Positions vs Currency Spot Price
EuroFX:
Last Six Weeks data for EuroFX futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 296924 | 93003 | 79103 | 13900 | 5301 |
| 03/04/2014 | 304308 | 103868 | 80416 | 23452 | 9552 |
| 03/11/2014 | 322020 | 110103 | 73718 | 36385 | 12933 |
| 03/18/2014 | 264443 | 117819 | 64828 | 52991 | 16606 |
| 03/25/2014 | 262179 | 106914 | 67280 | 39634 | -13357 |
| 04/01/2014 | 260075 | 101849 | 68611 | 33238 | -6396 |
British Pound Sterling:
Last Six Weeks data for Pound Sterling futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 257037 | 74558 | 45756 | 28802 | 6479 |
| 03/04/2014 | 254013 | 71021 | 41416 | 29605 | 803 |
| 03/11/2014 | 250867 | 64553 | 42554 | 21999 | -7606 |
| 03/18/2014 | 208961 | 64141 | 38605 | 25536 | 3537 |
| 03/25/2014 | 202115 | 66751 | 37027 | 29724 | 4188 |
| 04/01/2014 | 211437 | 75969 | 42397 | 33572 | 3848 |
Japanese Yen:
Last Six Weeks data for Yen Futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 203743 | 14727 | 99817 | -85090 | -5306 |
| 03/04/2014 | 205886 | 20407 | 100116 | -79709 | 5381 |
| 03/11/2014 | 242170 | 15726 | 115082 | -99356 | -19647 |
| 03/18/2014 | 156922 | 24144 | 85243 | -61099 | 38257 |
| 03/25/2014 | 158280 | 17600 | 86487 | -68887 | -7788 |
| 04/01/2014 | 188464 | 22162 | 110800 | -88638 | -19751 |
Swiss Franc:
Last Six Weeks data for Franc futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 55157 | 19396 | 19038 | 358 | 3186 |
| 03/04/2014 | 60532 | 21818 | 19650 | 2168 | 1810 |
| 03/11/2014 | 66889 | 23097 | 14140 | 8957 | 6789 |
| 03/18/2014 | 49391 | 25311 | 10195 | 15116 | 6159 |
| 03/25/2014 | 47353 | 25037 | 10218 | 14819 | -297 |
| 04/01/2014 | 47228 | 24800 | 10569 | 14231 | -588 |
Canadian Dollar:
Last Six Weeks data for Canadian dollar futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 141519 | 24865 | 83456 | -58591 | 6409 |
| 03/04/2014 | 147033 | 23306 | 84402 | -61096 | -2505 |
| 03/11/2014 | 153639 | 25180 | 77371 | -52191 | 8905 |
| 03/18/2014 | 186782 | 27751 | 97556 | -69805 | -17614 |
| 03/25/2014 | 133246 | 40441 | 73656 | -33215 | 36590 |
| 04/01/2014 | 117966 | 27549 | 64543 | -36994 | -3779 |
Australian Dollar:
Last Six Weeks data for Australian dollar futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 98643 | 10299 | 49290 | -38991 | 5407 |
| 03/04/2014 | 105792 | 12262 | 53370 | -41108 | -2117 |
| 03/11/2014 | 122241 | 8627 | 49477 | -40850 | 258 |
| 03/18/2014 | 81737 | 21577 | 46040 | -24463 | 16387 |
| 03/25/2014 | 84232 | 24387 | 44914 | -20527 | 3936 |
| 04/01/2014 | 93999 | 35398 | 40278 | -4880 | 15647 |
New Zealand Dollar:
Last Six Weeks data for New Zealand dollar futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 22142 | 16529 | 5547 | 10982 | 2076 |
| 03/04/2014 | 25616 | 19346 | 5914 | 13432 | 2450 |
| 03/11/2014 | 31905 | 21155 | 6706 | 14449 | 1017 |
| 03/18/2014 | 31463 | 24645 | 8894 | 15751 | 1302 |
| 03/25/2014 | 32748 | 26243 | 8030 | 18213 | 2462 |
| 04/01/2014 | 32313 | 25765 | 7285 | 18480 | 267 |
Mexican Peso:
Last Six Weeks data for Mexican Peso futures
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Large Specs Net | Weekly Change |
| 02/25/2014 | 128542 | 9971 | 31540 | -21569 | 1743 |
| 03/04/2014 | 126885 | 8230 | 28980 | -20750 | 819 |
| 03/11/2014 | 166949 | 12739 | 20986 | -8247 | 12503 |
| 03/18/2014 | 111057 | 19320 | 20590 | -1270 | 6977 |
| 03/25/2014 | 115858 | 22769 | 24423 | -1654 | -384 |
| 04/01/2014 | 145270 | 49893 | 28109 | 21784 | 23438 |
*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).
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 graphs overlay the forex spot 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.
Article by CountingPips.com – Forex Apps & News
