Page 25 - Futures Money Machine-Study Session #5

Beyond The Basics

“COT” Report: Commitment of Traders …

• Commodity traders have access to a special market report each week that provides a snapshot of the
positions of large institutional traders and small speculators in each commodity futures category.
This information is called the commitment of traders report or “COT report” and is provided by the
Commodity Futures Trading Commission. If you are interested in doing some independent research
on the COT report you can get it free from the CFTC’s website at www.cftc.gov.

• The COT report is a great analytical tool for traders in any market because it provides up to date
information about the trend and the strength of the commitment traders have towards that trend in
each of the commodities markets. The COT report is also available on the most actively traded
futures contracts such as stock indexes, interest rates and currencies.

• The weekly data is useful but seeing the information within a chart to gather historical context can
provide additional insight. There are several excellent, free sources for these kinds of charts on the
internet. Alternatively you can compile your own version for the commodity contracts you want to
see.