The lesson is pretty simple: buy when trend is up and the COT index is in phase with the trend. In the bond example from 1999 through 2004, five and one-half years of action, we would have sidestepped all buy setups by the commercials until June 2000 and then taken buys only as the trend, the 52-week moving average, was up. Let’s look at bonds now with that perspective and the buys marked off, and only the buys when the trend was up (see Figure 13.3).