By CountingPips.com
Weekly CFTC Net Speculator Report
GOLD: Large futures market speculators cut back on their overall bullish bets in gold futures last week for a third straight week last week, according to the latest Commitment of Traders (COT) data released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday. Despite the decline in speculator positions, the gold price managed to rebound back over the $1,300 per ounce level in trading last week.
The non-commercial futures contracts of Comex gold futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of +88,599 contracts in the data reported through April 8th. This was a change of -11,546 contracts from the previous week’s total of +100,145 net contracts on April 1st.
Gold large speculator net positions have fallen for three consecutive weeks after reaching a 13-month high level on March 18th with a total bullish position of +136,814 contracts.
Over the weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday April 1st to Tuesday April 8th, the gold price rose from approximately $1,279.60 to $1,310.10 per ounce, according to gold futures price data from investing.com.
Last 6 Weeks of Large Trader Non-Commercial Positions
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Net Non-Commercials | Weekly Change | Gold Price |
| 03/04/2014 | 393266 | 171404 | 56238 | 115166 | 5702 | 1337.90 |
| 03/11/2014 | 415340 | 170482 | 51592 | 118890 | 3724 | 1346.70 |
| 03/18/2014 | 420626 | 183324 | 46510 | 136814 | 17924 | 1359.00 |
| 03/25/2014 | 398264 | 169083 | 51766 | 117317 | -19497 | 1311.00 |
| 04/01/2014 | 363451 | 158152 | 58007 | 100145 | -17172 | 1279.60 |
| 04/08/2014 | 365400 | 149693 | 61094 | 88599 | -11546 | 1310.10 |
*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).
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