COT report explained: CFTC positioning data definition
By Ken Chigbo, Founder, KenMacro. Published 2026-05-13.
Quick answer
The COT report is a weekly publication from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission showing aggregate positioning in futures and options markets. It breaks open interest into trader categories such as commercials, large speculators and small traders, giving the market a structured view of who is long and who is short.
What is COT report?
The Commitments of Traders report, known as the COT report, is published every Friday at 3:30pm ET by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, reflecting positions held as of the prior Tuesday close. It aggregates open interest in US futures and options markets, broken down by trader category. The legacy report groups participants into commercials, non-commercials and non-reportables. The disaggregated and Traders in Financial Futures reports split these further into producers, swap dealers, managed money, other reportables and dealers. The data covers commodities, equity indices, rates, and currency futures, including the CME currency contracts that proxy major forex pairs.
How traders use COT report
The desk treats the COT report as a positioning gauge rather than a timing tool. Retail traders typically watch managed money or non-commercial net positioning in CME currency, gold, oil and Treasury futures to identify crowded trades. When speculator net longs reach multi-year extremes, the data flags vulnerability to a positioning unwind on adverse news. Institutional users build z-scores or percentile ranks of net positioning over rolling windows, then overlay these against price to spot divergences. The report lags by three trading days, so it is unsuitable for short-term execution decisions. Currency desks pair the CME EUR, GBP, JPY and AUD contracts with spot positioning surveys to triangulate broader forex flow. Commodity traders cross-reference commercial hedger behaviour against producer cost curves.
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Common misconceptions about the COT report
The first misconception is that the COT report is a directional signal. It is a snapshot of positioning, not a forecast. Extreme readings can persist for months before any unwind occurs. The second is that commercials are smart money. Commercials hedge price risk, not direction, so their positioning reflects business exposure rather than market view. The third is that the data is current. The Tuesday cut-off and Friday release create a lag that makes the report unsuitable for tactical entries. Finally, the report only covers US-listed futures, not the OTC spot forex market, so it captures a fraction of true global currency flow.
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Frequently asked
When is the COT report released?
The CFTC publishes the COT report every Friday at 3:30pm Eastern Time. The data reflects positions held as of the close of business on the preceding Tuesday, creating a three-day lag between the observation date and publication. If a US federal holiday falls during the week, the release can be delayed to the following Monday. The CFTC website hosts current and historical files in both short and long formats, and the data is free to download.
What is the difference between commercials and non-commercials in the COT report?
Commercials are entities that use futures to hedge a commercial business exposure, such as oil producers selling crude futures or grain elevators hedging inventory. Non-commercials are large speculators, typically hedge funds and commodity trading advisors, who trade futures for profit rather than hedging. Non-reportables are small traders whose positions fall below CFTC reporting thresholds. The disaggregated report refines these categories further into producers, swap dealers, managed money and other reportables.
Can the COT report be used for forex trading?
Yes, but indirectly. The CME lists currency futures on EUR, GBP, JPY, AUD, CAD, CHF, NZD and MXN against the US dollar, and the Traders in Financial Futures report breaks down positioning by dealer, asset manager, leveraged funds and other reportables. The desk uses this as a proxy for speculative forex positioning, particularly the leveraged funds category. However, CME volume is a small fraction of global spot forex turnover, so the data captures sentiment rather than complete flow.
How do traders measure extreme positioning in the COT report?
The standard approach is to convert net positioning into a normalised metric. A common method is the COT index, which expresses current net positioning as a percentile of its range over a rolling lookback, often 156 weeks. Readings above 80 suggest crowded long positioning and readings below 20 suggest crowded short positioning. Some desks instead compute a z-score of net positions over a similar window. These tools flag vulnerability to unwinds but do not signal precise turning points.
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