UPDATE 1-IMM dollar prolonged bets top given Sept 2008-CFTC

Fri Feb 19, 2010 4:40pm EST Related News IMM speculators dollar long bets highest since "08: CFTCFri, Feb 12 2010UPDATE 1-IMM speculators dollar long bets highest since "08-CFTCFri, Feb 12 2010IMM speculators increase long bets on US dollar-CFTCFri, Feb 5 2010IMM speculators go long US dollar-CFTCFri, Jan 29 2010IMM speculators increase short bets on US dollar-CFTCFri, Jan 22 2010

(Updates with details) NEW YORK, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Currency speculators increasedbets the U.S. dollar will rise to the highest level since theweek of Sept. 23, 2008, according to Commodity Futures TradingCommission data released on Friday. The value of the dollar"s net long position rose to $9.69billion in the week ended Feb. 16, from $9.41 billion in theprior week. The Reuters calculation for the aggregate U.S. dollarposition is derived from the net positions of InternationalMonetary Market speculators in the yen, euro, British pound,Swiss franc, Canadian and Australian dollars. The net short euro position at 59,422 contracts hit a freshrecord. Speculators boosted their short bets against sterling andreduced their long positions on the yen. The CFTC data also showed speculators sharply increasedtheir bets on the Canadian dollar, with long positions at23,455 contracts, up from 8,863 in the previous week. To be short a currency is to bet it will decrease in value,while being long a currency is a bet that its value will rise. JAPANESE YEN (Contracts of 12,500,000 yen) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 35,691 41,352Short 21,779 18,956Net 13,912 22,396 EURO (Contracts of 125,000 euros) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 34,459 34,867Short 93,881 92,019Net -59,422 -57,152 POUND STERLING (Contracts of 62,500 pounds sterling) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 13,922 14,012Short 70,001 66,768Net -56,079 -52,756 SWISS FRANC (Contracts of 125,000 Swiss francs) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 10,763 9,219Short 15,430 16,115Net -4,667 -6,896 CANADIAN DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 Canadian dollars) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 35,026 24,285Short 11,571 15,422Net 23,455 8,863 AUSTRALIAN DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 Aussie dollars) 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 43,315 44,346Short 16,312 16,740Net 27,003 27,606 MEXICAN PESO (Contracts of 500,000 pesos)-1,342,317,429.41 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 43,429 42,328Short 8,965 10,054Net 34,464 32,274 NEW ZEALAND DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 New Zealanddollars) -525,728,850.00 2/16/10 week 2/09/10 weekLong 14,523 14,359Short 7,088 9,636Net 7,435 4,723 (Reporting by Wanfeng Zhou; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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