The record long starts to unwind into the June 30 tariff callCopper FuturesCOMEX_DL:HG1!NightbricksQuick follow-up to last week's copper positioning read, because the new data changed the shape of the setup right before the catalyst. What changed. The US Section 232 copper review still reaches its decision point on June 30. The fresh CFTC report dated June 23, the last one before that date, shows the crowded long starting to come off the boil. Front-month COMEX copper is holding near 6.14 per pound, roughly where it sat a week ago, so the move this week is in positioning rather than in price. The numbers. Managed Money, the speculative crowd, trimmed its net long from about 71,000 contracts to about 69,000 in the week to June 23, while the producer and merchant hedgers who handle the physical metal covered part of their short, from about 101,000 net short to about 98,000. On a standardised basis the speculative long is still historically stretched, a COT Index up in the mid-90s out of 100 and a z-score near plus 1, just off the near-record high it printed the prior week. Open interest fell by roughly 6,000 contracts, so this reads as two sides trimming risk into the event, not fresh money piling in. Why it matters. This is the early shape of the asymmetry the first post flagged. A long that was sitting near a record had little dry powder left to chase a bullish headline, and the first thing that tends to happen into a binary catalyst is a quiet unwind rather than a violent one. The book is lighter than it was, but with the COT Index still in the mid-90s it is nowhere near neutral, so the risk of a sharper unwind on a disappointing or already-priced outcome is still very much on the table. How to read it on the chart. Watch the June 30 reaction against the same range support near the recent lows that held last week. A continued bleed in the speculative net long while price holds is the constructive reset that sets up a cleaner continuation later. A price break while the long is still this crowded is the version where positioning, not fundamentals, does the damage. Context. The COT Index and z-score come from standardising the CFTC data, which is what the free COT Index Lite indicator plots directly in a pane on this chart, and what the COTInsight dashboard scores across 475 plus markets every Friday. Data via the CFTC Commitments of Traders report dated June 23 2026. Nothing here is investment advice, and futures carry substantial risk.