The latest IMM data cover the week February 11-18, 2014
IMM positioning data released last Friday showed a build in non-commercial net long EUR positions and investors are now again long the single currency in absolute sense – albeit still close to broadly square. Investors remain overall stretched long USD although positioning has moved from the 96th to the 92nd percentile.
FX positioning in the week to 18 February revealed that we still have five currencies in stretched short territory: JPY, AUD, MXN, CAD and RUB. While net longs were built in MXN and while JPY and AUD positioning were close to unchanged, net shorts were built in CAD and RUB. Speculators have not been this short CAD since March last year and the Ukrainian turmoil has led investors to be the most bearish on RUB in more than seven years. This suggests that considerable bad news is required to weaken RUB further.
For the first time in February speculators added net-long positions in the GBP. However, the GBP positioning remains in neutral territory and we still believe that positioning does not pose a barrier for a stronger sterling (see FX Forecast Update: Sterling set to shine in 2014, 14 February, where we argue that fundamentals and relative monetary policy point at a stronger GBP).
In commodities net-longs were added in copper for the first time in four weeks. In absolute sense non-commercial copper positioning is still short at the 43rd percentile. Net longs were also added in corn, wheat and gold and gold positioning has not been this long since the start of November 2013. Brent Crude positioning remains very stretched long.
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