Head of Commodity Strategy
Summary: Changes in speculative positions held by funds across 24 commodity futures during the week to August 20. Speculators were broad-based sellers of agriculture commodities with funds holding net-short positions in all but a couple. Gold and silver saw fresh buying while oil was mixed.
Saxo Bank publishes two weekly Commitment of Traders reports (COT) covering leveraged fund positions in commodities, bonds and stock index futures. For IMM currency futures and the VIX, we use the broader measure called non-commercial.
Of the three major crops corn took the biggest hit. After having sold 101k lots during the week funds are once again holding a net-short position. Ample supply, despite one of the wettest growing seasons on record, together with worries about demand has kept key crops under pressure during the growing season. Ahead of the tariff announcement last Friday speculators had sold 6k lots of soybeans.
The small price setback in gold and silver did nothing to dampen the bullish sentiment. The net-long in gold rose by 7k lots on a combination of short-covering and fresh longs while the 27% jump in silver longs was primarily driven by short-covering. HG Copper was bought for a second week and during this time the net-short has been reduced by 17%, primarily on short covering. The trade war escalation on Friday helped trigger renewed selling with the price closing at the weakest level since May 2017.
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