The market is looking fairly positive right now, but the interesting part is that not every commodity is moving for the same reason.
A quick look at the seven-day performance might make some of the biggest gainers look like the obvious choices. Concrete, for example, is up 8.82%, while Iron has gained 8.33%. That sounds impressive, but once we look at the order book, the picture becomes a little more complicated.
The real story is in the buying and selling depth.
Some commodities are showing clear signs that buyers are willing to step in, while others have actually built up quite a lot of sell-side pressure despite their recent price increases.
Here are the commodities that stand out from the latest numbers.
Paper has one of the strongest setups in the entire group.
It is up 4.97% over the last seven days, with a reported high of 0.193 and a low of 0.180. The current best bid is 0.195, while sellers are asking 0.197.
What makes Paper particularly interesting is the order book.
There are 572,492 units on the buy side, compared with just 42,942 units on the sell side. That gives Paper a huge 93% buy imbalance.
That's not a small difference. There is more than 13 times as much buy depth as sell depth.
It suggests that buyers are currently much more aggressive than sellers.
The only thing I'd be careful about here is chasing the price after such a strong move. Paper is already trading above its reported seven-day high, so it would be worth watching whether that buying pressure continues or whether some of those large buy orders disappear.
For now, though, Paper has the strongest buying signal in this dataset.
Case is another commodity that immediately catches the eye.
It is up 2.74% over seven days and is currently trading around 3.610–3.619. Its seven-day average is 3.545, while the weekly high is 3.647.
The order book is heavily tilted toward buyers.
There are 25,170 units waiting on the buy side, compared with only 4,722 on the sell side. That works out to an 84.2% buy imbalance.
That's a very strong number.
The price is also sitting close to its weekly high, so Case is in an interesting position. If buyers continue to absorb the available supply, breaking the 3.647 level could become the next important move.
On the other hand, because it is already close to the top of its recent range, a pullback wouldn't be surprising either.
Still, based purely on the current order book, Case is one of the strongest-looking commodities right now.
Fish is a little different.
Its seven-day gain is only 0.91%, which doesn't look particularly exciting at first. But the order book tells a better story.
The current bid is 3.422, with an ask of 3.473. There are 5,922 units of buy depth against 2,146 units of sell depth, giving Fish a 73.4% buy imbalance.
That's a significant advantage for buyers.
Another thing I like about Fish is that it isn't sitting right on its seven-day high. The high is 3.604, while the seven-day average is 3.372.
So, compared with some of the commodities that have already pushed right up to their weekly highs, Fish still has some room if buying momentum continues.
It is definitely one I'd keep an eye on.
Iron is currently the big momentum story.
It is up 8.33% over seven days, moving from a low of 0.083 to a high of 0.093. The seven-day average is 0.087, while the current market is around 0.091–0.092.
The order book is also on the buyers' side.
Iron has 1,271,142 units of buy depth compared with 830,972 units of sell depth, producing a 60.5% buy imbalance.
So both the price trend and the order book are pointing in the same direction.
The problem is that Iron has already had a pretty strong run.
At around 0.091–0.092, it is very close to its weekly high of 0.093. That means there isn't much room between the current price and recent resistance.
Iron still looks bullish, but this is probably a case where I'd rather see what happens around the 0.093 level than blindly chase the move.
Limestone has gained 5% over the past week, which puts it among the stronger performers.
The current bid is 0.083, with an ask of 0.084. Its seven-day average is 0.082, and the weekly high is also 0.084.
The order book is reasonably healthy:
Buy depth: 1,407,461
Sell depth: 1,039,177
Buy imbalance: 57.5%
There are more buyers than sellers, although the difference isn't nearly as extreme as what we're seeing in Paper or Case.
The main thing to watch here is the 0.084 level. Limestone is already sitting right around its weekly high, so a move above that level would be important.
If it fails there, we could see some profit-taking.
Coca hasn't actually moved over the last seven days.
Its reported change is 0.00%, with a seven-day range of 0.079 to 0.081.
At first glance, that doesn't make it particularly exciting. But the order book is worth watching.
There are 1,331,294 units of buy depth against 992,044 units of sell depth, resulting in a 57.3% buy imbalance.
So while the price isn't going anywhere yet, buyers are still showing up.
That could simply mean Coca remains stuck in a range, but if the buying pressure continues and the price starts moving above 0.081, the situation could change fairly quickly.
For now, I'd describe Coca as a watchlist rather than a momentum play.
Scraps is up 1.35% over seven days and has a 58.9% buy imbalance.
Its buy depth stands at 641,793, compared with 447,352 on the sell side.
Light Ammo is also showing a similar pattern. It is up 1.79%, with buyers accounting for 56.6% of the imbalance.
Neither one is showing the explosive demand we're seeing in Paper or Case, but both have something important going for them: buyers currently have the advantage.
Sometimes these are the types of markets worth watching before they become obvious momentum plays.
Steel has gained 2.50% over seven days, reaching a high of 1.688.
The current bid is 1.677, while the ask is 1.680.
Its order book is almost evenly split:
Buy depth: 44,654
Sell depth: 39,856
Buy imbalance: 52.8%
That's basically a balanced market with a slight advantage to buyers.
One positive point is the extremely tight 0.18% spread, which makes Steel one of the tighter markets in this group.
But there isn't enough here to call it strongly bullish. I'd put Steel in the neutral-to-slightly-bullish category for now.
This is probably the most important part of the data.
Several commodities have posted good seven-day gains, but their current order books are heavily weighted toward sellers.
And that's something worth paying attention to.
Concrete is up a massive 8.82% over seven days, making it the biggest weekly gainer in this dataset.
The price has moved from 1.630 to a high of 1.782, with a seven-day average of 1.673.
Sounds great, right?
But then we look at the order book.
There are only 9,740 units on the buy side, compared with 31,059 on the sell side.
The buy imbalance is just 23.9%.
So despite the huge weekly gain, sellers currently have more than three times the available depth of buyers.
That doesn't automatically mean Concrete is about to fall. Markets can continue rising even when the order book looks weak.
But it does mean that the 8.82% gain shouldn't be viewed as a guaranteed sign of continued strength.
In fact, Concrete is probably one of the clearest examples of why looking at price alone can be misleading.
Oil is up 3.51% this week, but its current order book isn't particularly encouraging.
Buy depth is 342,101, while sell depth is 728,805.
That gives it only a 31.9% buy imbalance.
In other words, sellers currently have more than twice the depth of buyers.
So while Oil has had a good week, the current order book suggests that there is plenty of supply waiting above the market.
That's something I'd want to see improve before becoming more confident in the move.
Ammo has risen 4.88%, reaching a seven-day high of 0.694.
But the current order book has:
41,990 buy depth vs. 86,577 sell depth.
That's only a 32.7% buy imbalance.
Again, the weekly chart looks good, but the current liquidity picture isn't nearly as convincing.
It could simply mean that sellers are taking profits after the recent run.
Bread has gained 2.82%, but only 28.9% of the current order-book imbalance favors buyers.
There are 8,771 buy units compared with 21,601 sell units.
That's a fairly large difference.
So although Bread has performed well over the past week, buyers will need to step up if the upward move is going to continue.
A few commodities are already showing both weak price performance and weak buying pressure.
Livestock is down 1.34%, with just 29.1% buy imbalance. Its sell depth of 32,220 is considerably higher than its buy depth of 13,248.
Wood is down 2.17% and has a 40.9% buy imbalance, again showing more supply than demand.
Petroleum is down 1.16%, with a 42.1% buy imbalance and sell depth of 567,641 compared with 413,170 on the buy side.
These aren't necessarily dead markets, but based on this snapshot, they don't have the same buyer support we're seeing in the stronger names.
When all the numbers are put together, a few names clearly separate themselves from the rest.
Paper is the biggest standout because of its extraordinary 93% buy imbalance.
Case comes next at 84.2%, while Fish is also impressive at 73.4%.
Then we have Iron and Limestone, which combine solid weekly gains with moderately positive order books.
That's quite different from commodities such as Concrete and Oil, where the price has gone up but sellers currently dominate the order book.
And that's probably the biggest takeaway from this market snapshot.
A strong seven-day gain doesn't necessarily mean the buying pressure is still there.
Sometimes a commodity can rise significantly and then run into heavy selling as traders take profits. Other times, an asset may barely move while buyers quietly build positions underneath the market.
That's why the order book is useful.
Based on the numbers provided, my current watchlist would look something like this:
Strongest buying pressure
93% buy imbalance and buy depth more than 13 times sell depth.
Very strong demand
84.2% buy imbalance and more than five times as much buy depth as sell depth.
Strong buyer support
73.4% buy imbalance with a reasonable distance from its weekly high.
Strong momentum
Up 8.33% with a 60.5% buy imbalance, although it is already close to the weekly high.
Solid bullish setup
Up 5% with a 57.5% buy imbalance, but currently sitting around its weekly high.
Potential accumulation
Flat for the week but still showing a 57.3% buy imbalance.
Moderately positive
Both have more buyers than sellers, although the imbalance isn't extreme.
The market doesn't look uniformly bullish or bearish. It's much more selective than that.
There are some very clear pockets of buying interest, particularly in Paper, Case, and Fish. Iron and Limestone also look healthy, although both are getting close to their recent highs.
On the other side, commodities such as Concrete, Oil, Ammo, Bread, Livestock, and Petroleum need more caution. Some of them have posted decent weekly gains, but the current order books show that sellers still have considerable strength.
If I had to reduce the entire dataset to one simple idea, it would be this:
Don't just look at what has already gone up. Look at where the buyers are still waiting.
That's where the more interesting opportunities and the potential risks are likely to show up in the next market move.