By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss
NEW YORK, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Speculators pared back their net long bets on the dollar for a second straight week, according to calculations by Reuters and U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission data released on Friday.
The value of the net long dollar position was $28.25 billion in the week ended Jan. 8, compared with $30.16 billion in the previous week. The speculative market has been long the dollar since mid-June last year.
The CFTC, which had stopped releasing the data because of the 35-day partial U.S. government shutdown, resumed on Feb. 1.
U.S. 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.
In a broader measure of dollar positioning 0#NETUSDFX= that includes net contracts on the New Zealand dollar, Mexican peso, Brazilian real, and Russian ruble, the U.S. dollar posted a net long position of $27.55 billion as of Jan. 8, compared with $29.55 billion a week earlier.
The dollar has struggled since the beginning of the year as several Federal Reserve officials have started to pull back a little bit on their bullish view on U.S. interest rates and the economy. That shift in stance culminated in last week's dovish comments that suggested the U.S. central bank may have to pause its rate-hiking cycle or cut rates if the economy warrants it.
In the cryptocurrency market, speculators' net short position on bitcoin Cboe futures increased to 1,306 contracts 0#1CFTC1330E1 in the week ended Jan. 8, up from 1,230 short contracts the previous week.
Bitcoin remains entrenched in a deep slump, which began early last year, despite a recovery on Friday as the currency slid into oversold conditions.
Bitcoin was last up 7.9 percent at $3,623 BTC=BTSP on the Bitstamp platform. It has dropped roughly 80 percent since soaring to an all-time high of nearly $20,000 in December 2017.
Japanese Yen (Contracts of 12,500,000 yen) $6.97 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
42,727
32,712 Short
104,041
121,335 Net
-61,314
-88,623 EURO (Contracts of 125,000 euros) $5.782 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
146,271
148,288 Short
186,804
194,936 Net
-40,533
-46,648 POUND STERLING (Contracts of 62,500 pounds sterling) $4.861 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
27,670
35,782 Short
87,762
92,696 Net
-60,092
-56,914 SWISS FRANC (Contracts of 125,000 Swiss francs) $2.899 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
5,724
5,931 Short
28,910
31,461 Net
-23,186
-25,530 CANADIAN DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 Canadian dollars) $5.029 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
19,287
34,330 Short
85,289
84,979 Net
-66,002
-50,649 AUSTRALIAN DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 Aussie dollars) $2.733 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
22,345
27,919 Short
60,120
54,210 Net
-37,775
-26,291 MEXICAN PESO (Contracts of 500,000 pesos) $-0.814 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
92,398
82,260 Short
61,416
72,488 Net
30,982
9,772 NEW ZEALAND DOLLAR (Contracts of 100,000 New Zealand dollars) $0.106 billion
08 Jan 2019
Prior week
week
Long
14,895
18,272 Short
16,433
16,310 Net
-1,538
1,962