Natural Gas COT Report
Live CFTC Commitments of Traders positioning for Natural Gas futures — commercial hedgers versus managed money. Latest report: September 15, 2026.
By RetailVest Researchsourced from CFTCupdated
Positioning signal
extreme_long
Large specs at extreme long position — contrarian bearish
Z-score (vs 3yr)
1.91
100th percentile
Open interest
403,350
+2,526 WoW
In plain English
Speculators lean bullish on Natural Gas, but positioning isn't at an extreme yet — there's still room for the trend to run before the crowd gets over-committed.
Who's positioned where
Commercials (hedgers)
-271,454
net · 98,052 long / 369,506 short
Managed money (specs)
+270,522
net · 291,134 long / 20,612 short
Commercial net — last 6 months
What this means for Natural Gas
The CFTC's weekly report splits Natural Gas futures positions into — producers and users hedging real exposure — and , the speculators taking the other side. Commercials are net short here, while specs are net long. Research on hedging pressure finds that when commercial hedgers are unusually net-short, it has historically preceded positive returns — so the (currently 1.91) matters more than the raw number.Natural Gas ultimately trades on storage levels and heating/cooling demand (degree days), and positioning is one input among those fundamentals.
Educational analysis, not investment advice. Positioning is descriptive and can stay extreme for long stretches.
Trade Natural Gas without futures — ETF proxies
Liquid ETFs that track Natural Gas. Same idea, no margin account required.
Leveraged/inverse ETFs (amber) reset daily and decay over time — for short holds only. Not investment advice.
Other COT reports
New to this? Read how to read the COT report or see the evidence behind hedging-pressure.