By CountingPips.com – Get our weekly COT Reports by Email
WTI Crude Oil Non-Commercial Positions:
Large speculators and oil traders raised their net positions in the WTI crude oil futures markets last week for a second consecutive week, according to the latest Commitment of Traders (COT) data released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday.
The non-commercial contracts of WTI crude futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 482,523 contracts in the data reported through January 24th. This was a weekly change of 17,845 contracts from the previous week which had a total of 464,678 net contracts.
Speculators have now pushed their bullish bets to a multi-year high level and have boosted their bets for seven out of the last nine weeks.
WTI Crude Oil Commercial Positions:
Free Reports:
Get Our Free Metatrader 4 Indicators - Put Our Free MetaTrader 4 Custom Indicators on your charts when you join our Weekly Newsletter
Get our Weekly Commitment of Traders Reports - See where the biggest traders (Hedge Funds and Commercial Hedgers) are positioned in the futures markets on a weekly basis.
Meanwhile, the commercial traders, categorized by the CFTC as hedgers or traders engaged in buying and selling for business purposes, totaled a net position of -497,940 contracts last week. This is a weekly change of -15,569 contracts from the total net of -482,371 contracts reported the previous week.
USO Crude Oil ETF:
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the USO Crude Oil ETF, which tracks the price of WTI crude oil, closed at approximately $11.37 which was a dip of $-0.06 from the previous close of $11.43, according to ETF market data.
*COT Report: The COT data, released weekly to the public each Friday, is updated through the previous Tuesday (data is 3 days old) and shows a quick view of how large speculators or non-commercials (for-profit traders) as well as the commercial traders (hedgers & traders for business purposes) were positioned in the futures 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).
Article by CountingPips.com
