Money Managers’ Positions in Crude
For the week to June 11, money managers significantly reduced their short positions whilst keeping their long positions fairly stable across the Brent and WTI futures benchmarks as traders reacted bullishly following the cratering prices of the previous week.
Managed by money long positions decreased by 1.6mb (-0.4%), whilst their short positions decreased by a vast 74.4mb (-31.8%), the greatest reduction seen since December 2023, and the greatest in percentage terms since April 2023. This raised the net positioning to 255mb, a 72.8mb (+39.8%) increase from the week to June 04, causing the long:short ratios for Brent and WTI futures to rise from 1.22:1.00 to 1.53:1.00 and 3.26:1.00 to 7.51:1.00, respectively. Notably, for WTI this is the highest ratio seen since October 2023.
Flat prices in both Brent and WTI rose by over $5/bbl from respective lows of $76.76/bbl and $72.45/bbl on June 04 to $82.35/bbl and $77.85/bbl by the end of the week on June 11, retracing many of the losses seen in the previous week.
