WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 (Xinhua) -- Market speculators held a net short position of Bitcoin futures for the week ending Tuesday, according to a report from U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) on Friday.
Non-commercial investors, commonly treated as market speculators, held a net short position of 770 Bitcoin future contracts for the week ending Tuesday.
Speculators and hedgers are different types of investors. Speculators try to make a profit from the assets' price volatility, whereas hedgers attempt to reduce or "hedge" the amount of risk created by price volatility during the holding period of the assets.
When investors "short" some kind of financial assets like currencies, commodities, options or futures, they hold a bearish view on the asset and believe there will be a drop in price.
On Friday, the price of the cryptocurrency surged to about 10,000 U.S. dollars, pushing its whole market value to about 175 billion dollars, according to trading website "Coinbase." This could change speculators' position on Bitcoin futures to net long.
The Bitcoin futures, traded at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in the United States, are derivative financial contracts that obligate the parties to transact an underlying asset at a predetermined future date and price. The underlying asset of each Bitcoin future contract includes five Bitcoins.
