Forex
In the latest reporting week to 3 June, the period saw the USD trade broadly weaker. Speculators nevertheless responded by reducing their overall short USD position versus the eight IMM FX futures contracts by 8%, to USD 12.2 billion. At the individual currency level, buying of EUR and MXN was more than offset by selling of JPY and CAD.
Strong metals and energy demand offset by agriculture selling
The reporting week to 3 June showed a major divergence in hedge funds’ appetite for exposure—strong demand for energy and metals, both precious and industrial, was partly offset by broad net selling across the agriculture sector. Overall, the Bloomberg Commodity Index rose 0.4% during the week, with strong gains across both metals sectors being offset by a 3.4% loss in the agriculture sector, where all components except coffee suffered setbacks.
At the individual commodity level, hedge funds concentrated their demand in WTI crude oil, gas oil, natural gas, gold, and silver. Meanwhile, the broad selling in agriculture was led by soybeans, corn, and sugar.
Silver—which had yet to break the USD 35 resistance level as of last Tuesday—saw its net long rise by 36% to 45.4k contracts, just 4.3k contracts below the five-year high set in March. In contrast, fresh short selling reduced the platinum net long by 31% to 12.8k contracts, just before prices embarked on a fresh surge that resulted in a 12% rise since last Tuesday.
