CFTC Responds to Pressure: New COT Release Schedule Brings Reports Back in Sync

After months of frustration among analysts, traders, and data providers, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has officially published a revised Commitment of Traders (COT) release schedule. The key message is clear: all remaining delayed reports are expected to be fully synchronized again by the end of 2025.

This update follows sustained public pressure from market participants who rely on timely and consistent COT data for positioning analysis, seasonality models, and systematic trading strategies.

What Happened?

Over the past year, the CFTC struggled with backlogs and irregular release timings, mainly caused by operational disruptions, staffing constraints, and internal system transitions.

• Multiple COT reports were released late
• Historical continuity was broken
• Week-over-week positioning comparisons became unreliable

For traders working with COT Indexes, Net Position deltas, or threshold-based signals, this created unnecessary analytical noise and forced many to manually patch missing data.

What’s New in the Updated Schedule?

According to the newly published CFTC recovery plan:

• All remaining delayed reports are now explicitly scheduled
• Weekly releases are planned to realign step-by-step
• Full synchronization of all COT reports is expected before year-end

The revised schedule applies across all major report types:

• Legacy COT
• Disaggregated COT
• Traders in Financial Futures (TFF)
• Supplemental COT reports

2025 Revised COT Release Schedule

As part of the normalization process, the CFTC has published a revised release calendar covering all remaining delayed Commitment of Traders reports for 2025. The table below summarizes the original publication dates versus the new, adjusted release dates.

* Catch-up release as part of the backlog recovery.
** Final report fully aligned with the regular publication cycle.

Source: CFTC – Commitment of Traders Release Schedule

Why This Matters for Traders

For discretionary and systematic traders alike, this update is more than an administrative detail. A stable release schedule directly improves:

• Reliable week-over-week positioning analysis
• Clean and consistent COT Index calculations
• Robust combinations of COT data with seasonality and macro filters
• Reduced risk of false signals caused by missing or delayed reports

If your workflow depends on Commercial vs. Non-Commercial positioning, extreme COT readings, or COT-based trade filters, this revised schedule restores confidence in the data pipeline.

Outlook

While the extended delays were painful, the revised CFTC schedule is a clear signal that the issue has been acknowledged and addressed. COT analysis is becoming fully usable again, historical backtests regain validity, and forward-looking models can be maintained without manual intervention.

We will continue monitoring the releases closely and update tools, indicators, and dashboards accordingly.