Silver Speculators Sharply Lifted Their Bets into A New Bullish Position

(December 16, 2018 - Zachary Storella)

Silver COT Futures Large Trader Positions
Silver Non-Commercial Speculator Positions:
Large precious metals speculators increased their bullish net positions in the Silver futures markets this 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 Silver futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 11,256 contracts in the data reported through Tuesday December 11th. This was a weekly rise of 11,891 net contracts from the previous week which had a total of -635 net contracts.
This week’s net position was the result of the gross bullish position rising by 1,822 contracts to a weekly total of 71,136 contracts compared to the gross bearish position which saw a fall by -10,069 contracts for the week to a total of 59,880 contracts.
The speculator’s selloff of their bearish bets pushed the new net position into bullish territory for the first time in eighteen weeks (since August 7th). The current standing is at the highest bullish position since July 10th when the net position totaled 23,699 contracts.
Silver Commercial Positions:
The commercial traders position, hedgers or traders engaged in buying and selling for business purposes, totaled a net position of -27,879 contracts on the week. This was a weekly shortfall of -12,461 contracts from the total net of -15,418 contracts reported the previous week.

Silver COT Futures Large Trader Vs Silver Futures

Silver Futures:
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the Silver Futures (Front Month) closed at approximately $1462.80 which was a shortfall of $-1.20 from the previous close of $1464.00, according to unofficial market data.