By CountingPips.com
Weekly CFTC Net Speculator Report
CRUDE OIL: Large futures market traders edged up their overall bullish bets in crude oil futures last week for a second 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 crude oil futures, primarily traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 391,783 contracts in the data reported for April 1st. This was a change of just +609 contracts for the week. The previous week had registered a total of 391,174 net contracts in the data through March 25th.
Over the weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday March 25th to Tuesday April 1st, the crude oil price modestly increased from $99.19 to $99.61 per barrel, according to Nymex futures crude oil price data from investing.com. Brent crude prices declined from $106.92 to $105.26 per barrel from Tuesday March 25th to Tuesday April 1st, also according to prices from investing.com.
Last 6 Weeks of Large Trader Non-Commercial Positions
| Date | Open Interest | Long Specs | Short Specs | Net Non-Commercials | Weekly Change | Oil Price |
| 02/25/2014 | 1643886 | 514502 | 98064 | 416438 | -3 | 101.83 |
| 03/04/2014 | 1687807 | 521727 | 95909 | 425818 | 9380 | 103.33 |
| 03/11/2014 | 1697240 | 511076 | 104244 | 406832 | -18986 | 100.03 |
| 03/18/2014 | 1623266 | 492620 | 108335 | 384285 | -22547 | 98.88 |
| 03/25/2014 | 1604566 | 498080 | 106906 | 391174 | 6889 | 99.19 |
| 04/01/2014 | 1644507 | 502389 | 110606 | 391783 | 609 | 99.61 |
*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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