Head of Commodity Strategy
Summary: The Commitments of Traders reports highlight speculators positions and changes made during the week to August 11 in FX, bonds and stocks. It was a strong week for risk with the S&P 500 adding 1.7% to its already strong gains, bond yields ticked higher while the Dollar Index dropped by 1.4% on weakness against all of its major peers. The elevated dollar short nevertheless saw its first reduction in eight weeks.
Saxo Bank publishes two weekly Commitment of Traders reports (COT) covering leveraged fund positions in bonds and stock index futures. For IMM currency futures and the VIX, we use the broader measure called non-commercial.
This summary highlights futures positions and changes made by speculators forex, bonds and stocks up until last Tuesday, August 18. It was a strong week for risk with the S&P 500 adding 1.7% to its already strong gains, bond yields ticked higher while the Dollar Index dropped by 1.4% on weakness against all of its major peers.
Despite fresh dollar weakness against most of the currencies tracked in this report, speculators nevertheless made their first albeit small reduction in their dollar short in eight weeks last week. The net short against ten IMM currency futures and the Dollar Index saw a 3% reduction after reaching a nine year high the previous week. The reduction to $32.6 billion, that was led by profit taking in euro, Swiss franc and Japanese yen was somewhat being offset by a strong week of Sterling buying. The buying of 9,325 lots (£583 million) saw the position reverse to a net long for the first time in four months.
