📊 COT Indicator History Pro — Actor Flow + Direction (Institutional / Hedgers / Retail)

CotIndicatorHistoryPro brings an advanced Commitments of Traders (COT) read directly onto your chart, with a clear breakdown by market participants (Institutional, Hedgers/Commercial, Retail).

It shows not only where each actor is positioned (predominantly long/short), but also what they are doing right now (increasing longs or shorts), plus a synthetic Direction line to highlight the prevailing bias.

The indicator loads its dataset from a secured JSON feed (HISTORY + OUTPUT) and aligns it safely on the chart (anti-lookahead option using PublicationDate).

🗓️ Weekly Data Update (Friday 21:00)

The COT dataset is updated every Friday at 21:00 (Europe/Rome time) thanks to a dedicated automation pipeline:
a sophisticated processing script performs the calculations and publishes the updated values to the JSON feed used by the indicator (and the related cBot ecosystem if installed).

✅ The indicator itself refreshes on-platform using your Refresh Seconds setting and will display the new weekly data as soon as it is published.

✅ What You Get (Lines + Panel)

🔥 “Flow” Lines (3 Actors) — ΔNet/OI%

These lines represent the week-over-week change in Net positions, normalized by Open Interest:

• 🔵 Institutional Flow (ΔNet/OI%)
• 🟡 Hedgers / Commercial Flow (ΔNet/OI%)
• 💗 Retail Flow (ΔNet/OI%)

📌 How to read it:

• Above 0 ⇒ the actor is increasing Net LONG (adding longs and/or covering shorts)
• Below 0 ⇒ the actor is increasing Net SHORT (adding shorts and/or cutting longs)
• Larger absolute values (e.g., ±1.5%, ±3%) ⇒ stronger and more meaningful positioning changes

🧭 “Direction” Line — Spec Bias Net/OI%

• ⚪ Direction (Spec Bias) Net/OI% summarizes the prevailing “speculative” direction (average of Institutional + Retail, with fallback if needed).

📌 How to read it:

• > 0 ⇒ Speculative bias LONG
• < 0 ⇒ Speculative bias SHORT
• ≈ 0 ⇒ FLAT / neutral phase

🧩 Info Panel (Full Context)

A built-in panel displays:

• 📄 Report Date / Publication Date
• 📌 Open Interest + WoW (week-over-week) change
• 🎯 Text signal (if available in OUTPUT)
• For each actor:
• • Bias (predominantly LONG / SHORT / FLAT) based on Net
  • Net/OI%
  • Flow (ΔNet/OI%)
  • WoW ΔLong / ΔShort / ΔNet to understand how the position changed

🧠 How to Read It (Simple & Practical)

✅ Flow vs Bias (Key Difference)

• Flow = what they are doing now (adding longs or shorts)
• Bias = how they are positioned overall (predominantly long or short)

Example:

• Institutional Bias LONG + positive Flow ⇒ they are still pushing long
• Institutional Bias LONG + negative Flow ⇒ long reduction / possible rotation

🚦 Typical Trading Scenarios

✅ Scenario A — Trend Confirmation

• Direction > 0
• Institutional Flow > 0
  ➡️ Long pressure is consistent: often a continuation setup.

✅ Scenario B — Potential Reversal (Smart Money vs Retail)

• Institutional Flow > 0 while Retail Flow < 0
  ➡️ Retail sells/shorts while institutions buy: possible accumulation.
  (Opposite = possible distribution)

✅ Scenario C — Hedgers as an “Alert”

• Hedgers at extreme levels (Net/OI far from neutral) + strong Flow
  ➡️ Possible excess zone / aggressive hedging (often better as a warning than a direct entry trigger).

✅ Scenario D — Market “Loading Up” (Breakout Risk)

• Strong Flow + Open Interest WoW rising
  ➡️ New positions are entering: probability of extended moves often increases.

⚡ 10-Second Reading Routine

1. Check Direction: LONG (>0) or SHORT (<0)
2. Check Institutional Flow: confirms or diverges?
3. Check Retail Flow: confirms or does the opposite?
4. Check Open Interest WoW: expansion or position unwinding?

✅ Supported Symbols + Key Legend (JSON Symbol Keys)

The indicator can analyze any instrument available in the JSON feed (field data[].symbol in OUTPUT).

How to select the correct instrument

• External Symbol Key = AUTO 👉 automatically uses the chart symbol (and removes any suffix after “.”, e.g., US2000.ecn → US2000).
• If your broker uses different symbol names 👉 set External Symbol Key to the exact JSON key (case-insensitive).

Current keys in the feed (example snapshot: reportDate 2026-02-17, publicationDate 2026-02-20)

• FX: AUDUSD, EURUSD, GBPUSD, USDMXN
• Indices: US100, US2000, DOW30, VIX
• Commodities/Metals/Agriculture: BRENT, WTI, COPPER, CORN, WHEAT, XAU (Gold), XAG (Silver)
• Crypto: BTC, ETH

📌 If you don’t see values on the chart:

1. verify the chart symbol matches a JSON key
2. set External Symbol Key manually (e.g., ETH, US2000)
3. check the panel Report/Publication Date to confirm the latest dataset loaded

⚙️ Notes

• Supports safer alignment with Use PublicationDate (anti-lookahead) ✅
• Lines and panel can be enabled/disabled individually.

📌 Disclaimer: informational indicator only, not financial advice. COT data is weekly and should be contextualized with trend, key levels, and volatility.