Portfolio managers further increased their long positions in the most quoted oil contracts, with bullish bets centered almost entirely on US benchmark WTI Crude, Reuters columnist John Kemp wrote in an analysis of latest exchange data.
Between the week and Feb. 9, hedge funds and other money managers bought the equivalent of 33 million barrels in the six most traded futures and oil options contracts. The purchase was mainly concentrated in WTI Crude, where the long position rose by the equivalent of 30 million barrels between the week and February 9, suggesting that hedge funds expected the price of oil to rise. American increased, as the Arctic explosion was expected to spread to the end as Texas says, Kemp says.
Long positions in oil contracts have now risen for 14 consecutive weeks, which is the longest and largest increase in bullish bets on oil since early 2019, according to Kemp.
Expectations of higher WTI crude oil prices materialized this week and WTI crude oil prices rose above $ 60 a barrel for the first time in more than 13 months on Monday. The last time WTI Crude traded above $ 60 was in early January 2020, before the pandemic began to worry traders and fund managers.
During the week through Feb. 9, position extremes above or above a year high were observed in a variety of commodities, from crude and commodities to copper and corn, Ole Hansen, chief of staff, said Monday. Saxo Bank commodity strategy, commenting on traders ’reporting commitments.
The combined long net position in Brent and WTI (the difference between bullish and bearish bets) rose to a 28-month high, with 727,500 lots, according to the report.
This is still 33% lower than the record of 1.1 million lots compared to March 2018, according to Hanso of Saxo Bank.
“While last week short-term momentum indicators began to call for consolidation, short-term ratios remain low, indicating that speculative duration has more room to grow before trading begins to look full “, added.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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