Silver Non-Commercial Positions:
Large speculators reduced their net positions in the silver futures markets last week for the first time in the past ten weeks, according to the latest Commitment of Traders (COT) data released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday.
The non-commercial futures contracts of Comex silver futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 93,453 contracts in the data reported through March 7th. This was a weekly decline of -1,970 contracts from the previous week which had a total of 95,423 net contracts.
Speculative positions have been on quite a run over the past ten weeks going from +58,911 net contracts on December 27th to a high of 95,423 net contracts two weeks ago.
Silver Commercial Positions:
Free Reports:
The commercial traders position, categorized by the CFTC as hedgers or traders engaged in buying and selling for business purposes, totaled a net bearish position of -105,862 contracts last week. This is a weekly change of 2,148 contracts from the total net of -108,010 contracts reported the previous week.
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the SLV ishares ETF, which tracks the price of silver, closed at approximately $16.55 which was a fall of $-0.82 from the previous close of $17.37, according to ETF financial market data.
*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).
Article by CountingPips.com
