Speculators trimmed their net long bets on the U.S. dollar in the week ended Dec. 31, according to calculations by Reuters and Commodity Futures Trading Commission data released on Tuesday. The value of the net long dollar position was $30.16 billion, compared with $32.48 billion in the week ended Dec. 24. The speculative market has been long on the dollar since mid-June last year.

To be long on a currency means traders believe it will rise in value, while being short points to a bearish bias. US dollar positioning was derived from net contracts of International Monetary Market speculators in the yen, euro, British pound, Swiss franc and Canadian and Australian dollars. Due to the 35-day partial US government shutdown, the CFTC stopped releasing the data but resumed last week, starting with the figures for the week of Dec. 24, 2018.

Copyright Reuters, 2019