But the information that follows is accurate, as I’m able to compute this data manually. In this week’s ‘Days to Cover’ chart, the Big 4 traders are short about 100 days of world silver production, up about 2 days from last week’s COT Report. The ‘5 through 8’ large traders are short an additional 47 days of world silver production, down about 2 days from last Friday’s report, for a total of about 147 days that the Big 8 are short — and obviously unchanged from last week’s COT Report. [Note: As of last week’s report, Ted says there was at least two Managed Money traders in the Big 8 short category. This fact distorts the numbers you see above — and the distortions in silver are now so great, that I’m not going to bother doing much in the way of calculations…just approximations.] That 147 days that the Big 8 traders are short, represents just under 5 months of world silver production, or 315.2 million troy ounces/63,049 COMEX contracts of paper silver held short by these eight traders…at least two of which are Managed Money traders. Ted said that the ‘commercial only’ component of this number was around 235 million troy ounces, which works out to about 109 days of world silver production held by these Big 8 commercial traders…up 4 days from last week — and a lot different that the 147 days that’s shown on the ‘Days to Cover’ chart posted above. He also said that the Big 4 commercial traders are short around 150 million troy ounces — and that works out to about 70 days of world silver production, up 5 days from last week, which is hugely different from the 100 days on the chart above. Ted said that his raptors, the 27-odd small commercial traders other than the Big 8 shorts, are net long silver by around 182.5 million troy ounces…up about 7.5 million troy ounces from the 175 million they were long in last week’s COT Report…a very big number. Of course that number has decreased somewhat after Friday’s trading session as some of the sold their long positions for a profit yesterday. Just how much they sold, won’t be know until next Friday’s COT Report. In gold, the Big 4 are short 35 days of world gold production, up 1 day from last Friday’s COT Report. The ‘5 through 8’ are short 23 days of world production, unchanged from last week…for a total of 58 days of world gold production held short by the Big 8 — and obviously up one day from last Friday’s COT Report. The reason that there was an increase in days in gold, despite the fact that the Big 4 shorts covered 5,431 short positions during the reporting week, was the simple fact that they were replaced by an equal number [plus more] short contracts by the Managed Money trader that inhabits that same category. So, like for silver, the days of world production held short by the commercial traders in gold is a very decent amount less than shown in the previous paragraph and, for the same reason, this applies to platinum and palladium as well…plus copper and WTIC. The Big 8 traders are short 45.4 percent of the entire open interest in silver in the COMEX futures market, which is virtually unchanged from the 45.5 percent they were short in the last COT report. And once whatever market-neutral spread trades are subtracted out, that percentage would be a bit over the 50 percent mark. In gold, it’s 36.9 percent of the total COMEX open interest that the Big 8 are short, down a hair from the 37.1 percent they were short in last Friday’s COT Report — and something over the 40 percent mark once their market-neutral spread trades are subtracted out. And as Ted always and correctly points out, we won’t know that the lows are in until we see them in the rear-view mirror. So far, we’ve been fooled more than several times since these engineered declines commenced starting at the blow up in the LME nickel market back on March 8. But after yesterday’s price action, I’ll be happy to bet that proverbial ten bucks on the fact that the lows placed in both gold and silver on Thursday, will never be seen again. As I keep reminding you in this spot every Saturday, the circumstances in silver have been altered by an unimaginable [and monstrously bullish] amount by Ted’s discovery of the 1 billion troy ounce physical short position in silver that Bank of America holds in the OTC market, courtesy of JPMorgan & Friends…along with the big increase in Goldman’s derivatives position in silver in that market. They’ve increased even more in the latest OCC Report for Q2/2022… which Ted figures is a long position. And not to be forgotten is the 51+ million troy ounce short position in SLV…as of the latest short report last week. The situation regarding the Big 4/8 concentrated commercial short positions in silver, gold is still obscene — but not nearly as obscene as it was back on March 8…the 2022 highs in both gold and silver. After Friday’s price action, its only a guess if they added to their short positions on those big rallies in both. As Ted has been pointing out ad nauseam forever, the resolution of the Big 4/8 short positions will be the sole determinant of precious metal prices going forward…with that resolution currently obviously still a work in progress at the moment…but more and more looking like the end is in sight, if not upon us already. And, as always, nothing else matters — and I certainly look forward to what he has to say in his weekly review later this afternoon EDT. |