Categories: Financial Market News

Currency Speculators added to Dollar short bets, USD marks new 2014 low level

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 added to their bearish bets of the US dollar last week and brought the overall USD position to the lowest level of the year.

Non-commercial large futures traders, including hedge funds and large International Monetary Market speculators, had an overall US dollar short position totaling -$2.03 billion as of Tuesday May 6th, according to the latest data from the CFTC and calculations by Reuters. This was a weekly change of -$1.344 billion from the -$0.686 billion total short position that was registered on April 29th, 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.

The USD position has now been on the bearish side for the past four weeks after having crossed over into bearish territory on April 15th. The current level is the most bearish level in the dollar since October 29th 2013 when the bearish position equaled -$3.15 billion.

For the week, speculators increased their bets in favor the euro, Japanese yen and the New Zealand dollar while there were weekly declines for the Canadian dollar, British pound sterling, Swiss franc, Australian dollar and the Mexican peso.

Notable changes:

  • Euro positions rose to the highest level since April 1st although the data was recorded before the ECB rate decision on Thursday – where the ECB hinted at possible easing policy in June
  • Japanese Yen net positions fell to the lowest bearish level of 2014 (lowest level since October 15, 2013)
  • Australian dollar net positions fell for a 2nd week following a streak of 7 straight weekly increases & remain on bullish side for 5th week
  • British pound sterling positions declined for a 3rd week

 

* 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.

Weekly 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
04/01/2014 260075 101849 68611 33238 -6396
04/08/2014 261439 92635 69335 23300 -9938
04/15/2014 270722 106252 78564 27688 4388
04/22/2014 266259 101204 75430 25774 -1914
04/29/2014 271515 102285 76551 25734 -40
05/06/2014 277013 110673 78122 32551 6817

British Pound Sterling:

Last Six Weeks data for Pound Sterling futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 211437 75969 42397 33572 3848
04/08/2014 226667 91642 45165 46477 12905
04/15/2014 226688 87472 36874 50598 4121
04/22/2014 237055 89692 41892 47800 -2798
04/29/2014 236030 85913 41679 44234 -3566
05/06/2014 241264 83794 43148 40646 -3588

Japanese Yen:

Last Six Weeks data for Yen Futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 188464 22162 110800 -88638 -19751
04/08/2014 181814 13340 100802 -87462 1176
04/15/2014 164843 14351 83067 -68716 18746
04/22/2014 165674 16564 83807 -67243 1473
04/29/2014 168820 13846 84198 -70352 -3109
05/06/2014 167093 20381 81109 -60728 9624

Swiss Franc:

Last Six Weeks data for Franc futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 47228 24800 10569 14231 -588
04/08/2014 44752 19275 7940 11335 -2896
04/15/2014 48976 23905 9839 14066 2731
04/22/2014 46888 21732 7709 14023 -43
04/29/2014 47424 21960 8257 13703 -320
05/06/2014 55538 25102 11918 13184 -519

Canadian Dollar:

Last Six Weeks data for Canadian dollar futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 117966 27549 64543 -36994 -3779
04/08/2014 120336 28704 63011 -34307 2687
04/15/2014 119525 28288 63714 -35426 -1119
04/22/2014 118707 27529 62984 -35455 -29
04/29/2014 123589 30093 60388 -30295 5160
05/06/2014 122287 28044 59644 -31600 -1305

Australian Dollar:

Last Six Weeks data for Australian dollar futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 93999 35398 40278 -4880 15647
04/08/2014 96887 37630 34320 3310 8190
04/15/2014 98933 40463 32366 8097 4787
04/22/2014 107696 49540 33170 16370 8273
04/29/2014 109934 50019 39313 10706 -5664
05/06/2014 104936 44805 36168 8637 -2069

New Zealand Dollar:

Last Six Weeks data for New Zealand dollar futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 32313 25765 7285 18480 267
04/08/2014 32898 26521 6755 19766 1286
04/15/2014 33100 26671 6824 19847 81
04/22/2014 32579 26056 5881 20175 328
04/29/2014 29858 22979 4499 18480 -1695
05/06/2014 33025 25027 4334 20693 2213

Mexican Peso:

Last Six Weeks data for Mexican Peso futures

Date Open Interest Long Specs Short Specs Large Specs Net Weekly Change
04/01/2014 145270 49893 28109 21784 23438
04/08/2014 130331 70371 13870 56501 34717
04/15/2014 131412 71038 16801 54237 -2264
04/22/2014 128932 68329 14818 53511 -726
04/29/2014 128100 68073 18455 49618 -3893
05/06/2014 146455 67663 19779 47884 -1734

*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

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