WTI Crude Oil Non-Commercial Positions:
Large speculators sharply boosted their bullish net positions in the WTI crude oil futures markets last week for a second straight week, according to the latest Commitment of Traders (COT) data released by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday.
The non-commercial contracts of WTI crude futures, traded by large speculators and hedge funds, totaled a net position of 556,607 contracts in the data reported through February 21st. This was a weekly jump by 48,151 contracts from the previous week which had a total of 508,456 net contracts.
WTI speculative bullish bets are now at a new all-time high level, according to our data going back to the mid-1980s. Net bullish bets have gained by just under +80,000 net contracts in just the past two weeks alone and show an extreme level of optimism by speculators of where they think oil prices are going.
WTI Crude Oil Commercial Positions:
Meanwhile, on the other side of that equation, the commercial traders position (categorized by the CFTC as hedgers or traders engaged in buying and selling for business purposes) sharply raised their short position to total a net position of -571,785 contracts last week. This is a weekly change of -45,368 contracts from the total net of -526,417 contracts reported the previous week.
USO Crude Oil ETF (NYSE:USO):
Over the same weekly reporting time-frame, from Tuesday to Tuesday, the USO Crude Oil ETF, which tracks the price of WTI crude oil, closed at approximately $11.54 which was a rise of $0.16 from the previous close of $11.38, according to ETF market data.