Currency speculators eased their bets against the US dollar slightly though their long Japanese yen position remained near a three-year high, weekly data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission showed on Friday.
The net short US dollar position dropped to $16.3 billion in the week to January 8, compared with $16.8 billion the prior week. The aggregate US dollar position is derived from the net positions of International Monetary Market speculators in yen, euro, British pound, Swiss franc, Canadian and Australian dollars.
Speculator extended bets in favour of the yen remained high at 37,199 contracts, only slightly down from the 37,473 contracts the week before. The January 8 total was the most since November 2004 and well above 920 contracts the prior week.