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S&P 500: Commitments of Traders

CFTC positions as of the close on 13 October 2026. E-MINI S&P 500 - CHICAGO MERCANTILE EXCHANGE, $50 x s&p 500 index.

Speculators net short115,841

Change on the week+12,113

Rank in 2 years42nd

Open interest2,802,490

This week

In the week to 13 October 2026, non-commercial traders in S&P 500 held a net short position of 115,841 contracts. That is 12,113 contracts more than a week earlier. Commercial traders were net long 14,092, which is the other side of the same market. A year ago the speculative net was short 156,342, so it has moved by 40,501 contracts since. Longs were 39.8% of speculative positions. 487 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 −115,841

341,680 12.2% 225,839 8.1%

Commercial (producers, hedgers) net +14,092

1,674,753 59.8% 1,688,845 60.3%

Non-reportable (small traders) net +101,749

187,812 6.7% 289,561 10.3%

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 +9,457

Non-commercial short −2,656

Commercial long −13,459

Commercial short −4,171

Open interest +862

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"

68 net +14,092 (+0.5% of OI)

Mid-range.

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

36 net −115,841 (−4.1% of OI)

Mid-range.

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

57 net +101,749 (+3.6% of OI)

Mid-range.

Who holds what

Trader category	Long	Short	Net	Week change (long)
Non-commercial (speculators)	225,839	341,680	−115,841	+9,457
Commercial (producers, hedgers)	1,688,845	1,674,753	+14,092	−13,459
Non-reportable (small traders)	289,561	187,812	+101,749	–
Non-commercial spreading	598,245 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 S&P 500, 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	−115,841	+12,113	39.8%	2,802,490
6 Oct 2026	−127,955	−2,880	38.6%	2,801,628
29 Sep 2026	−125,076	−14,150	38.8%	2,754,989
22 Sep 2026	−110,924	−43,547	40.0%	2,715,529
15 Sep 2026	−67,379	−3,846	44.2%	3,434,277
8 Sep 2026	−63,533	+1,118	44.7%	3,040,746
1 Sep 2026	−64,651	−1,240	44.6%	3,017,307
25 Aug 2026	−63,412	−63,005	44.5%	2,997,596
18 Aug 2026	−407	−25,833	50.0%	3,104,040
11 Aug 2026	+25,427	+32,375	52.2%	3,154,383
4 Aug 2026	−6,948	−4,976	49.4%	3,170,383
28 Jul 2026	−1,974	+659	49.8%	2,854,678
21 Jul 2026	−2,633	+29,121	49.8%	2,785,508
14 Jul 2026	−31,753	+5,382	47.1%	2,819,884
7 Jul 2026	−37,136	−4,885	46.5%	2,820,380
30 Jun 2026	−32,251	−445	47.0%	2,816,721

Across the 104 weeks held, the speculative net ranged from -218,641 to 128,528, averaging -88,070. This week's -115,841 sits at the 42nd 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

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 equity index markets

Source: CFTC Commitments of Traders, legacy futures-only report, contract market code 13874A. 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.