(Agrimoney) Hedge funds turned bearish on agricultural commodities en masse, undertaking their biggest switch short in positioning on record, led by grains – in which they may ironically have boosts the chances of price gains. Managed money, a proxy for speculators, slashed its net long position in futures and options in the top 13 US-traded agricultural commodities, from corn to sugar, by 232,217 contracts in the week to last Tuesday, analysis of data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission regulator shows.
The cut in the net long – the extent to which long bets, which profit when values rise, exceed short holdings, which benefit when prices fall – was the largest on records going back to 2006.
