The latest Commitments of Traders report was released, covering positions through Tuesday
The 3-Year Min/Max Screen shows that "smart money" commercial hedgers used the volatility to establish quite a few new multi-year extremes in a variety of markets. They added to net longs in the small-cap Russell 2000, now holding the most net long contracts since 2016. They aggressively added to bets against the U.S. dollar. The Backtest Engine shows that when hedgers held more than 75% of open interest net short, the dollar index showed a positive return three months later after only 16 out of 46 weeks. At the same time, hedgers reduced shorts against gold and silver. Their short exposure against those metals is the lowest in three years, though still well off the net long (or nearly so) positions at some major bottoms. Volatility in palladium has been intense and hedgers used it to snap up more than 50% of open interest for only the 2nd time ever.
