Speculators increased their bets against the yen this week, shorting the Japanese currency by the biggest margin in nearly a year, but reduced their long position in the Australian dollar, data showed on Friday. The Commodity and Futures Trading Commission's report also showed speculators' net short US dollar position totalled $25.11 billion in the week to April 12, compared to $25.18 billion the prior week.
The aggregate US dollar position is derived from the net positions of International Monetary Market speculators in the yen, euro, British pound, Swiss franc, Canadian and Australian dollars. The slight improvement in dollar sentiment again came mostly at the expense of the yen. Speculators went short the Japanese currency to the tune of 52,877 contracts, or US $7.9 billion, up from 43,231 contracts last week.
That was the biggest net short yen position in contract terms since May 2010. Short positions rose 7,313 to 67,060 contracts while long positions totalled 14,183, a drop of 2,333 contracts. Open interest in yen positions rose 9,452 contracts to 130,084 contracts.
Open interest is taken as a sign of the strength in a given price movement though not an indication of direction. Increasing open interest is said by analysts to illustrate strength behind the price movement, while a drop shows weakening price movement. A rise in open interest also indicates that the security is being actively traded while a decline would show less activity.
Non-commercial reportable long positions represented 10.9 percent of open interest while non-commercial reportable short positions were 51.6 percent of open interest. Non-commercial speculators were net long the euro to a total of 64,985 contracts, up from 59,857 contracts the week before, and the highest since December 2007.
The net position dollar value of US $11.8 billion was made up of 105,425 long contracts, a rise of 6,020 contracts from the prior week, and 40,440 short contracts, 892 contracts more than the prior week. Open interest stood at 243,203 contracts, up 6,933 from the prior week. Non-commercial reportable long positions represented 43.3 percent of open interest while non-commercial reportable short positions were 16.6 percent of open interest.
Non-Commercial speculators were net long the aussie to 90,651 contracts, just down from 90,938 contracts the week before. The net position dollar value of US $9.46 billion, was made up of 97,153 long contracts, a drop of 2,237 contracts from the prior week, and 6,502 short contracts, 1,950 contracts down from the prior week. Open interest stood at 149,033 contracts, a jump of 2,925 from the prior week. Non-commercial reportable long positions represented 65.2 percent of open interest while non-commercial reportable short positions were 4.4 percent of open interest.