“In December, $2.27 billion was pulled out of SPDR Gold Shares, the world’s largest exchange-traded fund backed by the metal. That was a third straight monthly loss and the biggest since May 2013. Money managers have also turned less bullish on bullion, cutting their net-long positions for a seventh straight week to the smallest since February, U.S. government data showed Friday,” reports Luzi-Ann Javier for Bloomberg.
“Large scale speculators began to cut back on bullish bets as far back as September and the latest weekly data from the CFTC show net longs down to fewer than 3.6 million ounces, 88% below the July record. It’s the most bearish net positioning since January 2016 and has been accompanied by a significant increase in gross shorts – bets that gold could be bought back cheaper in future – which have more than doubled since the Trump victory to a one-year high,” according to Mining.com.
Since the start of 2017, investors have yanked $634 million from GLD, the largest gold ETF.
For more information on the gold market, visit our gold category.
Tom Lydon’s clients own shares of GLD.