The Commitments of Traders Report (COT Report) is a set of weekly publications from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) that shows aggregate open positions in covered futures and options-on-futures markets by trader classification. It is a positioning snapshot, not a record of who traded during the week or why each position was opened. Its categories depend on the applicable report family, so similarly named or economically similar groups should not be treated as interchangeable across reports.
COT data generally describe positions as of the close of business on Tuesday and are published at 3:30 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday. Holidays or other disruptions can alter the observation date, the publication date, or both. The CFTC receives large-trader position data from reporting firms and uses the intervening period to correct and verify them. A Friday release therefore does not show Friday positioning: it is normally a delayed Tuesday snapshot.
Which COT report are you reading?
The Legacy report classifies reportable positions as Commercial or Non-Commercial. The Disaggregated report for physical commodity markets uses Producer/Merchant/Processor/User, Swap Dealer, Managed Money and Other Reportables. Traders in Financial Futures (TFF) uses Dealer/Intermediary, Asset Manager/Institutional, Leveraged Funds and Other Reportables for financial markets. The Supplemental report shows Commercial, Non-Commercial and Index Trader classifications for selected agricultural markets. Legacy, Disaggregated and TFF are available in Futures Only and Futures and Options Combined formats; the Supplemental report is combined only. Report family determines the classification framework, while report format determines whether options are included.
Trader labels describe the CFTC classification framework, not the motive behind every contract. Classification is based primarily on the trader's reported predominant business purpose, subject to CFTC staff review. A trader classified as a Producer/Merchant/Processor/User, for example, can hold positions in that commodity that are not hedges. Category totals can therefore describe positioning structure without identifying each participant's intent.
Reporting thresholds also require care. When a trader reaches the applicable large-trader reporting level in a single futures month or option expiration, reporting firms report that trader's entire position across all futures and option expirations in that commodity, not merely the amount above the threshold. A market generally appears in COT reporting only when at least 20 traders are reportable. Nonreportable Positions are derived as the residual between total open interest and Reportable Positions.
Combined does not mean raw futures plus raw options
In the Futures and Options Combined format, option positions are converted to futures-equivalent exposure using delta factors before being combined with futures positions. Long calls and short puts contribute to long futures-equivalent exposure; short calls and long puts contribute to short futures-equivalent exposure. The combined report is therefore an exposure-adjusted view, not a simple count of option contracts added to futures contracts. Comparing Futures Only with Combined data also requires attention to spreading treatment, so simple subtraction should not automatically be interpreted as a clean options-only positioning series.
COT data can reveal concentration, category-level positioning and changes through time, but those observations are not directional signals. Extreme net positioning can persist, classifications can change, and similar aggregate positions can arise from different motives. The report is most informative as a structured, lagged measure of market participation rather than a prediction of what price must do next.
