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Organization and Business
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2014
Organization Consolidation And Presentation Of Financial Statements Disclosure [Line Items]  
Organization and Business
NOTE 1 - ORGANIZATION AND BUSINESS
 
The United States 12 Month Oil Fund, LP (“USL”) was organized as a limited partnership under the laws of the state of Delaware on June 27, 2007. USL is a commodity pool that issues limited partnership shares (“shares”) that may be purchased and sold on the NYSE Arca, Inc. (the “NYSE Arca”). Prior to November 25, 2008, USL’s shares traded on the American Stock Exchange (the “AMEX”). USL will continue in perpetuity, unless terminated sooner upon the occurrence of one or more events as described in its Second Amended and Restated Agreement of Limited Partnership dated as of March 1, 2013 (the “LP Agreement”). The investment objective of USL is for the daily changes in percentage terms of its shares’ per share net asset value (“NAV”) to reflect the daily changes in percentage terms of the spot price of light, sweet crude oil delivered to Cushing, Oklahoma, as measured by the daily changes in the average of the prices of the 12 futures contracts for light, sweet crude oil traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange (the “NYMEX”), consisting of the near month contract to expire and the contracts for the following 11 months for a total of 12 consecutive months’ contracts, except when the near month contract is within two weeks of expiration, in which case it will be measured by the futures contract that is the next month contract to expire and the contracts for the following 11 consecutive months (the “Benchmark Oil Futures Contracts”), less USL’s expenses. When calculating the daily movement of the average price of the 12 contracts, each contract month will be equally weighted. It is not the intent of USL to be operated in a fashion such that the per share NAV will equal, in dollar terms, the spot price of light, sweet crude oil or any particular futures contract based on light, sweet crude oil. It is not the intent of USL to be operated in a fashion such that its per share NAV will reflect the percentage change of the price of any particular futures contracts as measured over a time period greater than one day. United States Commodity Funds LLC (“USCF”), the general partner of USL, believes that it is not practical to manage the portfolio to achieve such an investment goal when investing in Oil Futures Contracts (as defined below) and Other Oil-Related Investments (as defined below). USL accomplishes its objective through investments in futures contracts for light, sweet crude oil, and other types of crude oil, diesel-heating oil, gasoline, natural gas and other petroleum-based fuels that are traded on the NYMEX, ICE Futures or other U.S. and foreign exchanges (collectively, “Oil Futures Contracts”) and other oil-related investments such as cash-settled options on Oil Futures Contracts, forward contracts for oil, cleared swap contracts and over-the-counter transactions that are based on the price of crude oil, diesel-heating oil, gasoline, natural gas and other petroleum-based fuels, Oil Futures Contracts and indices based on the foregoing (collectively, “Other Oil-Related Investments”). As of December 31, 2014, USL held 658 Oil Futures Contracts for light, sweet crude oil traded on the NYMEX and did not hold any Oil Futures Contracts traded on the ICE Futures.
 
USL commenced investment operations on December 6, 2007 and has a fiscal year ending on December 31. USCF is responsible for the management of USL. USCF is a member of the National Futures Association (the “NFA”) and became a commodity pool operator registered with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (the “CFTC”) effective December 1, 2005. USCF is also the general partner of the United States Oil Fund, LP (“USO”), the United States Natural Gas Fund, LP (“UNG”), the United States Gasoline Fund, LP (“UGA”) and the United States Diesel-Heating Oil Fund, LP (“UHN”), which listed their limited partnership shares on the AMEX under the ticker symbols “USO” on April 10, 2006, “UNG” on April 18, 2007, “UGA” on February 26, 2008 and “UHN” on April 9, 2008, respectively. As a result of the acquisition of the AMEX by NYSE Euronext, each of USO’s, UNG’s, UGA’s and UHN’s shares commenced trading on the NYSE Arca on November 25, 2008. USCF is also the general partner of the United States Short Oil Fund, LP (“DNO”), the United States 12 Month Natural Gas Fund, LP (“UNL”) and the United States Brent Oil Fund, LP (“BNO”), which listed their limited partnership shares on the NYSE Arca under the ticker symbols “DNO” on September 24, 2009, “UNL” on November 18, 2009 and “BNO” on June 2, 2010, respectively. USCF is also the sponsor of the United States Commodity Index Fund (“USCI”), the United States Copper Index Fund (“CPER”), the United States Agriculture Index Fund (“USAG”) and the United States Metals Index Fund (“USMI”), each a series of the United States Commodity Index Funds Trust (the “Trust”). USCI, CPER, USAG and USMI listed their shares on the NYSE Arca under the ticker symbol “USCI” on August 10, 2010, “CPER” on November 15, 2011, “USAG” on April 13, 2012 and “USMI” on June 19, 2012, respectively. On January 30, 2015, USCF as the sponsor of the Trust and its series USMI announced that its officers and members had authorized a plan to (i) liquidate USMI, (ii) terminate the continuous offering of USMI, and (iii) deregister USMI under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”), and therefore, terminate the Trust’s obligation to include USMI on its periodic and current reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). USCF has submitted written notice to the NYSE Arca of its decision to liquidate USMI, terminate the offering and to terminate USMI’s obligations under the Exchange Act.
 
USCF intends to file a post-effective amendment on behalf of the Trust and USMI to terminate the offering of the registered and unsold shares of USMI. The NYSE Arca will file a Form 25 with the SEC to affect the withdrawal of the listing of USMI from Arca. Delisting from Arca will become effective 10 days after the filing date of the Form 25. Provided that USMI continues to meet the applicable legal requirements, USCF intends to file a Form 15 on behalf of the Trust and USMI with the SEC in early April 2015 to suspend the Trust’s duty to include USMI on its reports under Sections 13(a) and 15(d) of the Exchange Act. USMI expects the termination of registration will become effective 90 days after the date of the filing of the Form 15 with the SEC.
 
All funds listed previously are referred to collectively herein as the “Related Public Funds.”
 
USL issues shares to certain Authorized Participants (“Authorized Participants”) by offering baskets consisting of 50,000 shares (“Creation Baskets”) through ALPS Distributors, Inc., as the marketing agent (the “Marketing Agent”). The purchase price for a Creation Basket is based upon the NAV of a share calculated shortly after the close of the core trading session on the NYSE Arca on the day the order to create the basket is properly received.
 
From July 1, 2011 through December 31, 2014 (and continuing at least through May 1, 2015), the applicable transaction fee paid by Authorized Participants is $350 to USL for each order they place to create or redeem one or more baskets (“Redemption Baskets”); prior to July 1, 2011, this fee was $1,000. Shares may be purchased or sold on a nationally recognized securities exchange in smaller increments than a Creation Basket or Redemption Basket. Shares purchased or sold on a nationally recognized securities exchange are not purchased or sold at the per share NAV of USL but rather at market prices quoted on such exchange.
 
In December 2007, USL initially registered 11,000,000 shares on Form S-1 with the SEC. On December 6, 2007, USL listed its shares on the AMEX under the ticker symbol “USL”. On that day, USL established its initial per share NAV by setting the price at $50.00 and issued 300,000 shares in exchange for $15,000,000. USL also commenced investment operations on December 6, 2007 by purchasing Oil Futures Contracts traded on the NYMEX based on light, sweet crude oil. As of December 31, 2014, USL had registered a total of 100,000,000 shares.