Silver Non-Commercial Speculator Positions:
Large precious metals speculators sharply raised their bullish bets 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 22,750 contracts in the data reported through Tuesday January 2nd. This was a weekly advance of 18,102 contracts from the previous week which had a total of 4,648 net contracts.
Speculative positions had been on a steady decline over the previous five weeks with the net position making a recent low of +2,469 contract on December 19th. This week’s bullish jump brought the net position level to its highest level in four weeks.
Silver Commercial Positions:
The commercial traders position, hedgers or traders engaged in buying and selling for business purposes, totaled a net position of -37,192 contracts on the week. This was a weekly decrease of -16,453 contracts from the total net of -20,739 contracts reported the previous week.
iShares Silver (NYSE:SLV) ETF:
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the SLV ishares ETF, which tracks the price of silver, closed at approximately $16.21 which was an advance of $0.62 from the previous close of $15.59, according to unofficial market data.