By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. dollar net longs slid in the latest week, according to Reuters calculations and Commodity Futures Trading Commission data released on Friday.
The value of the net long dollar position declined to $1.06 billion in the week ended Aug. 17, from $3.08 billion in the previous week. U.S. dollar positioning has been net long for five straight weeks after staying net short for 16 months.
U.S. dollar positioning was derived from net contracts of International Monetary Market speculators in the Japanese yen, euro, British pound and Swiss franc, as well as the Canadian and Australian dollars.
In a broader measure of dollar positioning that includes net contracts on the New Zealand dollar, Mexican peso, Brazilian real and Russian ruble, the greenback posted a net long position of $796 million, down from $2.993 billion the previous week.
Despite the dip in U.S. dollar net long positioning, the greenback remained supported overall by Delta coronavirus variant concerns and expectations that the Federal Reserve could taper asset purchases under its quantitative easing program by the end of the year.
The dollar this week posted a 1% gain, the most in two months.
"Overall dollar positioning still remains relatively noncommittally small bullish," Shaun Osborne, chief FX strategist at Scotiabank, wrote in a report after the CFTC data.
"The strong performance in the U.S. dollar in the Wednesday to Friday period, not covered in the data in this report, would nevertheless suggest next week's figures will see a move in the U.S. dollar position in the opposite direction," he added.
The largest positioning change was in the euro, with net longs rising to 57,640 contracts this week, from 33,857 previously.
In the cryptocurrency market, bitcoin net shorts fell to 726 contracts, in the week ended Aug. 17, from net short contracts of 1,104 the previous week. This week's bitcoin shorts were the smallest since late March 2020.
Bitcoin continues to recover from the doldrums of the past few months. On Friday, it hit a three-month high of $49,163.98. From a six-month low hit in June, bitcoin has gained 67% of its value against the dollar.
Still the prospect of increased regulatory scrutiny globally has cast a somewhat dark shadow on bitcoin's outlook and the overall crypto sector.