Bloomberg- Hedge-fund managers and speculators reduced bets on higher oil prices by 80 percent since July as crude futures rose to records and U.S. regulators started investigating trading, government data show.
So-called speculative net long positions fell to 25,867 contracts on the New York Mercantile Exchange in the week ended May 27 from a record 127,491 on July 31, according to a U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission report on May 30.
The decline may complicate the CFTC’s probe as regulators try to determine how much of the rise in oil to more than $135 a barrel last month was caused by speculators who may have manipulated the market instead of consumer demand.
