Bearish bets against US Treasuries climb to new record

So-called "non-commercial" speculative positions selling the 10-year Treasury futures contract have been rising since the US presidential election and hit 816,156 contracts in the week to January 3, outnumbering long positions by 344,931 -- a record level -- according to fresh data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Friday.

The bearish tilt has accompanied a steep sell-off in US government debt since the US election, which has unleashed pent-up animal spirits among investors and driven equity markets higher, on the expectation that a looser regulatory regime and lower taxes will spur growth and rekindle inflation.

"There are big shorts out there," said Michael Cloherty, a strategist at RBC Capital Markets. "We see it in the futures data and we see it in the cash market too."