May 29th, 2007 http://www.tradersnarrative.com/commitment-of-traders-report-gives-bullish-signal-972.html The Commitment of Traders (COT) report is issued by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and shows how small speculators, commercials and large speculators have placed their chips in the futures markets. In contrast to other indicators like sentiment, it is an invaluable source of market information because it objectively lays out how the three separate players are positioned. The only caveat is that it comes with a two week delay (so insiders can still have an edge) so by the time you look at the target, it may have already moved. Nonetheless, as long as our time horizon is medium to long term it can still be useful. The latest report COT was released last week on Friday May 25th 2007. It showed a remarkable change in the behaviour of the commercial hedgers (known as the âsmart moneyâ). They not only reversed their recent short run bet against a rally, but are now sitting on one of the largest aggregate net long positions in the past 10 years. The S&P 500 COT report shows the commercial hedgers as net long as they were in the early part of 2003 while the âdumb moneyâ small speculators are still as short as they were at the March 2007 market bottom. In short, they are equally bearish even as the market has shaken off the dip we had in late February and early March 2007. Over at the Russell 2000 (the small caps) things are quite lopsided as well. The small speculators are net short as much as they were at the bottom of the market in the summer of 2006. Here are a few examples of previous times the commercial hedgers were close to this net long: October 2005 January 2004 March 2004 May 2004 September 2003 August - October 2002 September 2001 With the exception of the 2004 instances, this was a fantastic tell that the market was headed up (on an intermediate to long term time horizon). It is unusual to see such a lopsided bullish position by commercials after the market has risen considerably. Usually they step in and scoop up the market when it goes on sale due to panic selling (September 2001, for example). I would be more confident buying along with the commercials when the market has been spooked lower but under any circumstances, it is too risky to bet against them. That is what youâd be doing if you short this market right now.
Imo, Mini-Nasdaq 100 CoT's are a better thing to look at. They show sizeable bullish sentiment in the speculators.
I was amazed to read posts here a couple days ago that "the smart money is short, bracing for a collapse". It seems it's not. It appears to be bullish on average.
Precisely reiterating a prior post i showed... "About the only argument that convinces me on the bull side (aside from price action), is that there are a few entities with extremely deep pockets that are using derivatives to push buying power into the markets on an unprecedented scale. This does not equate to more buyers than sellers, nor does it reflect the crowd's view. It is very few buyers with colossal buying power. What's most interesting is how we normally find all the sentiment indicators most bearish at bottoms. They have been bearish all the way up to the present top, indicating that the majority of participants see a huge disconnect between the state of the economy and the current market performance. Too bad, neither their views, nor logic, move the markets, however-- concentrated, leveraged wealth does."
so i guess the COT doesnt lie, if its that bullish it only means onething, A very, very, very, long bull market.
True, although the reduced volatility increases the likelihood of a "thief in the night" style black swan event IMO. http://www.financialsense.com/Market/daily/tuesday.htm
thanks mak, very interesting. except for feb it has been a long time since a swing low has even been broken.
It never is...the smart money doesn't brace for anything.. something I read here a while back "Slaves predict. Kings react." So fuckin true.