C.o.t.

[seancass]

Can anyone point me in the direction of a site which clearly show the positions of the smart and dumb money in relation to forex trading please, in particular the EUR/USD? I am not sure whether a free site clearly displaying the Commitment of Traders is readily available. Many thanks indeed.
Sean

 

[frugi]

CME Euro and other currency futures COT available here:

http://www.cftc.gov/dea/futures/deacmesf.htm
http://www.cftc.gov/dea/options/deacmesof.htm (including options)

 

[seancass]

CME Euro and other currency futures COT available here:

http://www.cftc.gov/dea/futures/deacmesf.htm
http://www.cftc.gov/dea/options/deacmesof.htm (including options)

Thank you, Frugi. Much appreciated.
Sean

 

[rog1111]

HI Sean

Be careful with these COT reports, suggest you contact me about this sometime

Cheers
Roger

 

[charliechan]

Spill the beans 4 all rog1111!!!

the difficulty i have with cot re fx is this:

banks are both the 'commercial' and 'speculative' positions as we know - but the commercials are deemed either the producers or consumers of the commodity (gold, oil, currency etc). banks borrow (consume) vast amounts of fx for their own needs, as well as lend (produce).

anyway, im a day trader so i can plead my usual ignorance to this as im only concerned with the next few hours at most, not really next week.

perhaps our in house brain boxes like gammajammer or twalker will shine some light into my darkness.......

 

[jimbo57]

Can anyone point me in the direction of a site which clearly show the positions of the smart and dumb money in relation to forex trading please, in particular the EUR/USD? I am not sure whether a free site clearly displaying the Commitment of Traders is readily available. Many thanks indeed.
Sean

Now remind me please, which is the clever money and which is the dumb again?

 

[options]

Yes, please do tell Rog.

The only thing I was told to look at is the comercial positions only, but I have only found this favourable when it is heavily weighted to one side. But what do you do when the euro and the swiss are both weighted the same way?

As ever it is an indication of what the big boys want to happen but doesn't incude the day and time it will happen. So it is still a case of trade what you see.

If you do know of a good way to read this report Roger, then please share.

Anything that clarifies, and doesn't muddy the water can only be good.

But this is rare in trading.

 

[a_gnome]

IMHO the problem with using the COT reports for forex is the forex futures market volume is actually only a small fraction of the total daily spot FX volume so doesn't really tell you very much; all the serious players will be using the spot market.

If you had a COT report for the spot market on the other hand then that would be useful.

 

[Newtron Bomb]

COT shows commercial and hedge/specs division of money. One of the problems is that it is still lagging as GJ stated. But it can still be utilised pretty well.

There are two ways I have decided to utilise this report one way is to look for a potential turn from the current trend as dictated by any bias in the commercial money and secondly as a continiation while the dumb money continue to chase the trend.

Basically when the commercial and hedge/specs are at extremes of each other this is the time to sit up and start looking at your TA for potential entries and remember just because they are at extremes does not mean squat without confirmation of something setting up. These things can takes weeks to play out but in the case of FX you may have already missed the boat and was particularly so last year.


So with the extreme bias between the two my first thought goes to a conintinuation of the current trend as the non comms run the trend to the end and continuation pattern should be seen along the way and showing signs of exhaustion.

The second set up is from the commercial bias and indicates a potential change in trend and you are now waiting for the TA to give you a heads up as to WHEN this might happen.

In either case you should get the best of both worlds. One final way of viewing this for intraday trading as opposed to swing or positional trading is when you see the bias you can expect a certain degree of greater trending price action and those easily manageable trade that we all love to sit back with our feet up and watch.

OR, Finally you can chuck it in the bin and trade the chart as all you need to know is there.

Just my tupence worth

 

[Newtron Bomb]

http://www.cot-futures.com/cot/subscribers/trader.htm

This is one link that I used to get a graphical of the COT report

HTH
Phil

 

[rog1111]

My previous comments on COT reports are here :

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/showpost.php?p=76861&postcount=5

In the context of this current thread I would add that it is still possible to use the COT reports for long term trading currencies, although my warning to Seancass would have been not to try to pick the highs & lows vs the $, simply because the extremes in the COT positions can persist for quite some time. For example just because the Comm positions are at a 5 year record extreme of say 100k long, 9k short doesnt mean that you don't still have another 3 months or more to sit it out before a further extreme of 120k long, 6k short, and the price bottom is finally reached.

Far better IMO simply to take COT positions for the 5 major currencies - EUR, GBP, CHF, AUD, JPY vs the $, (not CAD, MP, NZD), try to find 2 that show fairly opposite extremes, and trade one against the other rather than outright against the $. In other words you are looking for one pair where the Comms are very long with negligible shorts, and another pair that shows the opposite. If the COT situation is not extreme and clear cut, don't trade ! But, you'll need plenty of patience to sit it out week after week, you'll have to do your own work re stops and targets, and don't expect perfection !

For currencies use the futures only reports. Also remember that the COT reports deal with futures, so if you are trading via a spot broker make sure that your prices correspond correctly, as futures are sometimes quoted round the other way.

Good luck and safe trading !
rog1111