S&P500 Non-Commercial Positions:
Large speculators and traders increased their net positions in the S&P500 stock futures markets last week for a fifth straight week, 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 S&P500 futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 8,350 contracts in the data reported through March 14th. This was a weekly gain of 1,404 contracts from the previous week which had a total of 6,946 net contracts.
Following gains over the last five weeks, speculators have now pushed their bullish bets up to their highest level since December 13th when total bullish net positions equaled 15,031 contracts.
S&P500 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 position of -16,241 contracts last week. This is a weekly change of -8,253 contracts from the total net of -7,988 contracts reported the previous week.
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the S&P500 index closed at approximately 2365.45 which was a dip of -2.93 from the previous close of 2368.38, according to 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
