How to read the Commitments of Traders report
The Commitments of Traders report, usually called the COT report, helps you examine how different groups are positioned in futures markets. It is useful for studying participation and changes in positioning over time. It does not tell you the next price, reveal every institution’s intentions or identify an entry by itself.
This guide explains the numbers you will encounter in a COT dashboard and the checks that make comparisons more meaningful. CIPEX uses futures-only CFTC reports alongside separately dated price information.
Start with the date of the positions
COT reports normally describe Tuesday’s positions and are released on Friday at 3:30 p.m. US Eastern time. Holiday schedules can differ. The positions date, publication date and date you opened a dashboard are therefore different things.
Write down the positions date before interpreting a change. A chart refreshed today can still contain the latest available weekly report rather than today’s holdings. Pairing that report with a newer price is useful for context, provided you keep the two dates visible.
Sources: CFTC release schedule
Read long, short and net positions together
Net positioning is long contracts minus short contracts. For a hypothetical group holding 120,000 longs and 90,000 shorts, the net position is +30,000 contracts. A positive net means that the group holds more longs than shorts; a negative net means the reverse.
A move from +30,000 to +20,000 is a decline of 10,000 contracts, but the group remains net long. That distinction matters: direction of change and direction of the outstanding position answer different questions.
Inspect the components too. The same fall in net positioning could result from fewer longs, more shorts, or both. If longs and shorts each increase by 10,000, net positioning stays unchanged even though gross participation has increased. A single net number hides that detail.
Use the right trader categories
Legacy reports distinguish commercial and non-commercial reportable traders, with non-reportable positions shown separately. Disaggregated reports for physical commodities provide more detail through Producer/Merchant/Processor/User, Swap Dealers, Managed Money and Other Reportables. Financial futures have a separate report family with its own categories.
These are classifications of traders, not a label explaining the purpose of each individual position. Treating every commercial short as a forecast of falling prices can confuse hedging exposure with a directional opinion. Likewise, a managed-money position does not identify a particular fund or reveal its entry price.
Keep the report family and category consistent when comparing history. A label such as Managed Money on a commodity market should not silently become a different group when you switch instruments.
Sources: CFTC disaggregated report categories · CFTC report families and classification methodology
Put the number into context
A position of 20,000 contracts is not automatically large or small. Compare it with that market’s own history and with open interest, the outstanding contracts in the market. Contract sizes and typical participation differ, so raw net counts alone are a poor basis for ranking unrelated markets.
A historical percentile answers where an observation sits within a chosen sample. It is not the probability that price will reverse. Change the lookback period and you change the comparison. Record that period when saving a research note.
A short reading routine
CIPEX brings these comparisons into a market workspace. Its calculated scores and labels are analytical interpretations of the underlying data; they are not CFTC recommendations. Use the figures to ask better questions about a market, rather than assuming that one group is always right.
- Confirm the contract, futures-only or combined format, report family and positions date.
- Read the current long, short and net figures, then compare each with the previous report.
- Compare the position with its own history and inspect open interest.
- Review separately dated price action and relevant market context before forming a research hypothesis.