Natural gas: Commitments of Traders

CFTC positions as of the close on 13 October 2026. NAT GAS NYME - NEW YORK MERCANTILE EXCHANGE, contracts of 10,000 mmbtu's.

Speculators net short232,878

Change on the week+4,177

Rank in 2 years2nd

Open interest1,761,366

This week

In the week to 13 October 2026, non-commercial traders in Natural gas held a net short position of 232,878 contracts. That is 4,177 contracts more than a week earlier. Commercial traders were net long 217,758, which is the other side of the same market. A year ago the speculative net was short 154,723, so it has moved by 78,155 contracts since. Longs were 35.3% of speculative positions. 322 traders reported.

Bar charts in detail

1. Who is long and who is short, in the week to 13 October 2026

Short positions extend to the left in red, long positions to the right in blue, each scaled against the biggest single side in this market. Percentages are of open interest.

Non-commercial (speculators) net −232,878

511,876 29.1% 278,998 15.8%

Commercial (producers, hedgers) net +217,758

393,571 22.3% 611,329 34.7%

Non-reportable (small traders) net +15,120

40,534 2.3% 55,654 3.2%

2. How the week's change was made

Change in each side since the previous report, as published by the CFTC. A rising net can come from longs being added, shorts being closed, or both; this shows which.

Non-commercial long +6,198

Non-commercial short +2,021

Commercial long −12,137

Commercial short −10,139

Open interest −69,566

3. Speculative net position, week by week

Last 52 weeks. Blue bars are net long, red bars net short. Hover a bar for the week and the value.

4. Weekly change in the speculative net

Blue bars: speculators added to their net position that week. Red bars: they reduced it. Tall bars of either colour are the unusual weeks.

5. Open interest, week by week

Total contracts outstanding. Rising open interest means money is entering the contract; falling means positions are being closed.

Where each group sits against its own year

0 means a group is at its most net short of the last 52 weeks, 100 at its most net long. It says where positioning is, not what price does next.

Commercials (producers, hedgers) the group classic COT analysis calls "smart money"

99 net +217,758 (+12.4% of OI)

At its most net long of the year.

Speculators (funds, managed money) trend-following money with no commercial business in it

3 net −232,878 (−13.2% of OI)

Near its most net short of the year.

Small traders (non-reportable) the group classic analysis calls "dumb money"

49 net +15,120 (+0.9% of OI)

Mid-range.

Who holds what

Trader category	Long	Short	Net	Week change (long)
Non-commercial (speculators)	278,998	511,876	−232,878	+6,198
Commercial (producers, hedgers)	611,329	393,571	+217,758	−12,137
Non-reportable (small traders)	55,654	40,534	+15,120	–
Non-commercial spreading	815,385 on both sides		0	–

Spreading is a speculator holding an equal long and short in different months, so it nets to zero and is listed apart. The three net figures should sum to zero, because a futures market cannot be net long or net short overall, only differently distributed between the people in it. In the Commission's published figures they occasionally miss by a contract or two: for the week shown the three nets sum to 0. That is rounding in the source, not an error on this page, and we leave the CFTC's numbers as published rather than adjusting one to make the column balance.

The last two years

Speculative net position in Natural gas, Oct 2024 to Oct 2026. Above the line is net long, below it net short.

Week	Spec net	Change	Long share	Open interest
13 Oct 2026	−232,878	+4,177	35.3%	1,761,366
6 Oct 2026	−237,055	−4,894	34.9%	1,830,932
29 Sep 2026	−232,159	−16,557	35.2%	1,796,124
22 Sep 2026	−215,602	+6,323	37.0%	1,853,483
15 Sep 2026	−221,926	−1,691	36.8%	1,835,136
8 Sep 2026	−220,234	−10,743	36.7%	1,837,184
1 Sep 2026	−209,492	−8,799	37.1%	1,819,853
25 Aug 2026	−200,693	+5,391	37.9%	1,762,883
18 Aug 2026	−206,084	−6,547	37.5%	1,743,477
11 Aug 2026	−199,536	+1,199	37.5%	1,706,695
4 Aug 2026	−200,735	−7,284	37.0%	1,719,031
28 Jul 2026	−193,452	−17,513	37.5%	1,683,026
21 Jul 2026	−175,939	+6,524	38.4%	1,695,624
14 Jul 2026	−182,463	−16,949	37.9%	1,676,383
7 Jul 2026	−165,514	+5,450	38.4%	1,678,099
30 Jun 2026	−170,963	+6,288	37.6%	1,643,920

Across the 104 weeks held, the speculative net ranged from -237,055 to -63,642, averaging -145,668. This week's -232,878 sits at the 2nd percentile of that range. Two years is a short window, and a position that looks far from its recent average can stay there for months. It describes where positioning has been, not where price goes.

Related on StocksXray

S&P 500 companies that operate in this industry. Their share prices respond to far more than futures positioning, so this list is a starting point for research, not a link between the two.

Company	Price	1D
DVN Devon Energy Corp	$50.73	+3.03%
EQT EQT Corp	$54.30	+3.53%
EXE EXPAND ENERGY Corp	$93.41	+2.87%

What this report is, and what it is not

The CFTC requires anyone holding more than a set number of contracts in a US futures market to report their position. Every Friday afternoon the Commission publishes the totals as they stood at Tuesday's close, split by the kind of trader holding them. The gap between Tuesday and Friday is deliberate and cannot be shortened: the figures are always three days old when you first see them.

Non-commercial traders have no commercial use for the underlying. Commercial traders do: a miner selling forward, an airline hedging fuel, a mill buying wheat. Non-reportable is everybody below the reporting threshold. The categories describe why someone is registered, not how clever they are, and the common framing of commercials as "smart money" does not follow from the data: a producer hedging output sells into a rising market because that is their business, not because they predict a fall.

Nothing on this page is a signal. Positioning shows how crowded a trade was on a particular Tuesday. It does not say when a crowd disperses, and crowded positions have stayed crowded for many months at a time in most of these markets.

Other energy markets

Source: CFTC Commitments of Traders, legacy futures-only report, contract market code 023651. Net positions, long share and the two-year rank are our arithmetic on the Commission's published figures; every input is in the tables above. Educational only, not financial advice.