46,000 shorts covered in the most recent report!!

January 13th commentary: “The large COT levels at the end of November became an overhang to further near term strength in gold. However, the six week consolidation has seen reductions in the net short commercial and long non-commercial positions by 30,000 and 35,000 respectively. In the strongest of gold’s bull markets we’ve only needed a decline of another 5,000 contracts to allow the market to stage its next significant advance. One more decline in price could be enough bring about this ‘cleansing’ of positions.“

We can assume that this week’s action should help to alleviate some of the large COT positions. However, the data is compiled on Tuesday’s for release on Friday so we will not discover the extent of impact until January 30th.

Could somebody please help me understand what the 46,000 number means in context to Bob Hoyes analysis.