Speculative traders in Bitcoin futures maintained a heavyweight bearish tilt this week, with leveraged funds reporting a net short position of 7,892 contracts as of Tuesday, September 8. This week's Bitcoin COT data, sourced from the CFTC Traders in Financial Futures report, shows leveraged funds grew their net short by 272 contracts over the prior week. Meanwhile, overall open interest climbed by 1,386 contracts, and asset managers retained a contrasting net long stance of 3,743 contracts. This positioning sits within a three-month window defined by some of the deepest and most tentative net shorts from speculators.
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Leveraged funds, a category that includes commodity trading advisors and hedge funds, wrote 13,038 short contracts against 5,146 long ones in the September 8 report. The resulting net of -7,892 contracts represents a further lean into bearish territory compared to the -7,620 net registered a week earlier. While leveraged funds edged more pessimistic, they remain less entrenched than the extreme short seen in late August.
In a long-running pattern, asset managers held the opposing side of the trade, finishing the week net long 3,743 contracts. This fundamental dynamic, leveraged funds net short facing asset managers net long, has been a persistent feature of the Bitcoin COT landscape. The total open interest across all reporting traders jumped to 21,083 contracts, signaling a busy week of new positioning in the derivatives market.
Pattern Over the Last 12 Weeks
The latest net short isn't an outlier but part of a sustained bearish posture from leveraged funds. Over the stored 12-week window, these traders have been net short in every single report. The intensity of that bearishness, however, has fluctuated, forming three distinct phases.
The first phase, from mid-June to early July, saw relatively moderate net shorts, with leveraged funds bottoming at -6,130 contracts on June 23.
The second phase, from mid-July through late August, was a steepening of the short bet. Leveraged funds grew their net short position from -7,491 contracts on July 14 to a window peak of -8,089 contracts on August 25. That date marks the most net-short week for leveraged funds in this three-month period.
A third, partial phase began in early September, showing a slight unwind from the August extreme. The September 1 report saw the net short pull back to -7,620, before ticking up again to -7,892 in the latest data. The pattern suggests leveraged funds are exploring the limits of their bearish conviction.
| Report date | Open interest | Lev fund long | Lev fund short | Lev fund net | Asset manager net |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-06-16 | 21,125 | 6,077 | 12,684 | -6,607 contracts | +2,507 contracts |
| 2026-06-23 | 20,554 | 4,925 | 11,055 | -6,130 contracts | +2,585 contracts |
| 2026-07-07 | 18,832 | 4,406 | 11,123 | -6,717 contracts | +2,385 contracts |
| 2026-07-14 | 19,385 | 4,015 | 11,506 | -7,491 contracts | +2,815 contracts |
| 2026-07-21 | 20,527 | 4,042 | 11,991 | -7,949 contracts | +2,727 contracts |
| 2026-07-28 | 20,019 | 3,295 | 10,168 | -6,873 contracts | +2,299 contracts |
| 2026-08-04 | 20,143 | 4,243 | 11,483 | -7,240 contracts | +2,542 contracts |
| 2026-08-11 | 21,185 | 4,997 | 12,049 | -7,052 contracts | +2,234 contracts |
| 2026-08-18 | 21,760 | 4,488 | 11,927 | -7,439 contracts | +2,732 contracts |
| 2026-08-25 | 22,216 | 3,181 | 11,270 | -8,089 contracts | +2,945 contracts |
| 2026-09-01 | 19,697 | 4,530 | 12,150 | -7,620 contracts | +3,698 contracts |
| 2026-09-08 | 21,083 | 5,146 | 13,038 | -7,892 contracts | +3,743 contracts |
Comparing Fund Class Imbalances
Side-by-side, leveraged funds and asset managers continue to act as natural trading counterparts. In the latest report, leveraged funds' net short of 7,892 contracts stands against asset managers' net long of 3,743 contracts. While not perfectly balanced, the recurring opposition suggests a fundamental dialogue in the market: asset managers, which can include pension funds and endowments, are taking a longer-term accumulation view, while leveraged funds provide liquidity and often a shorter-term, tactical outlook.
Week-over-week, asset managers increased their net long by a slim 45 contracts. Over the same period, leveraged funds increased their net short by 272 contracts. That small divergence widened the gap between the two groups' positioning.
Related Ether Cash-Settled COT
A separate CFTC report for Ether cash-settled futures shows a similar, though not directly comparable, trend. Leveraged funds were net short 7,286 contracts there as of September 8, down from a more extreme net short of 8,385 contracts two weeks prior. It's crucial to note this is a parallel tape; the Bitcoin COT positioning shown here did not cause the Ether positioning.
Anatomy of a COT Report
The Commitments of Traders report is a weekly snapshot of futures market positioning published by the CFTC. It categorizes traders into groups based on their primary business purpose. For Bitcoin, the two most-watched categories are leveraged funds, speculators like hedge funds and CTAs, and asset managers, institutional investors like pension funds. The report provides a count of long and short contracts held by each group. The net figure, calculated as long minus short, shows the aggregate directional bias. Negative for leveraged funds means they are, as a group, net short.
Interpreting Net Position Changes
When leveraged funds increase their net short position, as they did by 272 contracts this week, it means they either added more short contracts or covered some long contracts. The number is a net figure, so it doesn't reveal the gross activity underneath. It signals a collective move toward a more bearish posture week-over-week. Conversely, if this number were to become less negative (or positive), it would indicate a reduction in net bearishness.
Framing the Record Positions
In the context of the stored window, the latest leveraged funds net short of -7,892 contracts sits meaningfully below the most extreme reading. The record for this period was set on August 25, when the net short hit -8,089 contracts. Since that peak, leveraged funds have pulled back slightly, though this week's increase shows they haven't abandoned the bearish theme entirely. The window's least net-short week was June 23 at -6,130 contracts, underscoring how the baseline for speculative positioning has shifted more negative over the summer. Forecasts for the subsequent CFTC week are not included in this stored data, leaving the question of whether leveraged funds will extend or pare back their short bet unanswered for now.
You can explore more data via the full COT Positioning hub or the COT API.
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