Futures Only vs Futures and Options Combined: Which COT Report to Read

Key takeaways

• The CFTC publishes its main Commitments of Traders reports in two versions: Futures Only, and Futures and Options Combined, where options are converted into futures-equivalent positions using exchange delta factors.
• On the 8 September 2026 report, 233 of 336 markets we score showed identical numbers in both versions. The other 103 have an options book large enough to register.
• Across those 103, the COT Index moved by a median of 0.5 points between versions. Only 6 moved by 10 points or more.
• Where it does matter, it matters a lot. Gold read 57.2 combined and 65.8 futures only. Euro FX read 38.1 and 26.3.
• Options share is a warning light, not a verdict. Corn has 30.6% of its open interest in options and the two versions sit 0.8 points apart.

Introduction

Anyone who has pulled COT data from two different sources and got two different numbers for the same market has probably met this problem without knowing its name.

For its main Commitments of Traders reports, the CFTC does not publish one report per market. It publishes two, side by side, every week. One counts futures contracts only. The other adds options on those futures. Charting sites, newsletters and spreadsheets pick one, often without saying which.

For most markets the choice is harmless. For a handful it changes the answer. This guide explains what the combined report actually adds, shows how far apart the two versions sat on a real report, and gives a simple way to tell which kind of market you are looking at.

What the Two Reports Contain

Futures Only counts open futures contracts, split by trader category. Nothing else goes in.

Futures and Options Combined takes the same futures positions and adds each trader's options on those futures, converted into an equivalent number of futures. The CFTC's explanatory notes describe the method directly: option positions "are computed on a futures-equivalent basis using delta factors supplied by the exchanges."

In practice that means:

• Long calls and short puts count as long futures-equivalent positions.
• Short calls and long puts count as short futures-equivalent positions.
• The size depends on delta. The CFTC's own example is a long put of 500 contracts with a delta of 0.50, which counts as a short position of 250 futures.

Both versions exist for each of the main report families: Legacy, Disaggregated and Traders in Financial Futures. The Supplemental report on index traders is the exception and comes in the combined version only. So "the Disaggregated report for gold" is really two reports, and you need to know which one a number came from.

One Consequence People Miss: Delta Moves Without Anyone Trading

A futures position only changes when someone trades. A futures-equivalent options position also changes when the market moves, because delta changes with price.

A fund holding the same call options for a month can show a growing long position in the combined report simply because the market rallied and those calls moved deeper into the money. Nobody bought anything.

This is not an error in the data. The combined report is measuring directional exposure, and exposure really did grow. But if you read week-on-week changes in the combined report as "funds added longs", you will sometimes be describing a price move rather than a decision.

How Far Apart Are They? We Measured It

We took the 8 September 2026 report and compared both versions for every market we score that had a current reading in each.

For the 103 that differ, here is how far the COT Index (three-year range, 0 to 100) moved between the two:

So in a typical market with options, the two versions tell the same story. The difference shows up in a small number of markets, and there it can be the whole story.

Options share helps, but it does not decide

We grouped the 103 markets by how much of their combined open interest sits in options:

Below 5%, the version you read does not matter. Above 20%, roughly a third of markets moved by 5 points or more. But two thirds did not, and that is the part worth understanding.

Size alone does not decide the gap. What matters is whether the speculators' options lean differently from their futures. A large options book spread symmetrically across calls and puts barely shifts the net. A smaller one that leans hard in one direction can shift it a long way.

Three Markets and the Outliers From the Same Report

Gold: a big options book that leans

Gold carries 29.4% of its combined open interest in options. On 8 September 2026:

The net position differs by fewer than 5,000 contracts, yet the COT Index is 8.6 points apart. That is because the index compares each version with its own three-year history, and the options overlay has moved differently over those three years than the futures book has. The same net in a different history gives a different rank.

Euro FX: a small options share, a large gap

Options are only 10.8% of Euro FX open interest, yet this was one of the biggest gaps among the major markets:

Leveraged Funds held more short exposure through options than their futures alone show. Read the futures only version and the euro short looks more stretched against its own history. Read the combined version and it looks closer to the middle of the range.

Corn: a big options book that cancels out

Corn has 30.6% of its open interest in options, more than gold. The COT Index read 99.2 combined and 100.0 futures only. Managed Money's options add about 10,700 contracts to a net long of more than 414,000, too little to change the picture, so the extreme long reading holds up in both versions.

The outliers

Most of the largest gaps were in specialised markets where options dominate. ICE's penultimate natural gas contract has 84% of its open interest in options and read 14.0 combined against 68.3 futures only. In D6 RINs, speculators were net short 902 contracts combined and net long 1,848 futures only: the two versions disagreed about which side the funds were on.

None of these are errors. They are the same traders, measured two ways.

Which Version Should You Use?

There is no universally correct answer, but there is a sensible routine.

1. Check the options share first. If options are under 5% of open interest, stop worrying. Our 46 markets in that group showed a median gap of zero.

2. Above 20%, look at both. If they agree, you have a robust reading. If they disagree by more than a few points, the options book is doing something the futures book is not, and that is information in itself.

3. Use the combined version for exposure, futures only for decisions. The combined report is the better measure of how much directional risk a group is carrying. Futures only is the cleaner measure of what that group actually traded, because delta drift cannot move it.

4. Never mix versions across a history. A COT Index built from futures only history and compared with a combined current reading is not a reading at all. If a chart or spreadsheet does not say which version it uses, find out before you trust an extreme.

5. Remember which one other people quote. Different charts, newsletters and data vendors use different versions, and many do not say which. When someone's "record long" does not match yours, check the version before you check the maths. It is one of the quieter reasons a COT reading appears to fail, alongside the ones in our false signal guide.

Where COTInsight Fits

COTInsight shows the Futures and Options Combined report by default, because it is the more complete measure of the exposure each group carries.

• Pro includes 10 years of weekly history and CSV export on the combined report, so you can see a market's full positioning range rather than a single week.
• Ultimate adds the Futures Only toggle, which rescores every z-score, COT Index and regime on the futures only report, and an Options Exposure panel on each market. That panel shows the options share of open interest, the net position in both versions, and how much the options leg moves the headline number, with a plain note when the difference is large enough to matter.
• Ultimate also includes the full archive, PDF reports, AI commentary, the REST API and historical outcome statistics.
• The COTInsight TradingView indicator (Ultimate) puts the COT Index, z-score and regime straight onto your chart, so you can check a reading without leaving the market you are watching.

See the pricing page for what each plan includes, or open the dashboard.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between the Futures Only and Combined COT reports?

Futures Only counts open futures contracts. Futures and Options Combined adds options on those futures, converted into futures-equivalent positions using delta factors supplied by the exchanges. Both are published by the CFTC every week for the Legacy, Disaggregated and Traders in Financial Futures reports.

How are options counted in the COT report?

On a delta-adjusted basis. Long calls and short puts become long futures-equivalent positions, short calls and long puts become short ones. A long put of 500 contracts with a delta of 0.50 counts as a short position of 250 futures.

Does it matter which version I use?

For most markets, very little. On the 8 September 2026 report the median COT Index gap across 103 markets with options was 0.5 points. It matters in markets where speculators' options lean differently from their futures, such as gold (57.2 against 65.8) and Euro FX (38.1 against 26.3) on that report.

Why can the combined report change when nobody traded?

Because delta changes when price moves. An unchanged options position becomes a larger or smaller futures-equivalent position as the market rises or falls, so the combined report can show a change in exposure without any new trades.

Which version does COTInsight use?

Combined by default. Ultimate users can switch the whole dashboard to Futures Only and see an Options Exposure panel on every market that compares the two.

Summary

The CFTC publishes each COT report twice, with and without options. On a real report, 233 of 336 markets looked identical in both, and among the 103 that did not, the typical COT Index gap was half a point. The version only becomes important in markets where speculators' options lean differently from their futures. Gold and Euro FX were examples on 8 September 2026, and a few options-heavy specialist markets disagreed about which side the funds were on at all. Check the options share, compare both versions when it is high, and never mix versions inside one history. Everything here describes positioning data. It is not a forecast and not investment advice.