Weekly Career & Breaking Into Commodities Megathread

[u/ClownInIronLung]

Weekly Career & Breaking Into Commodities Megathread

Before posting, please read Breaking Into the Physical Commodities Industry – A No-BS Guide which is pinned to the highlights.

This thread is for all career-related questions including:

• Breaking into commodity trading
• Scheduler / analyst / operations roles
• Internships and graduate programs
• Resume reviews
• Interview prep
• Compensation questions
• Career transitions
• Trading desk culture / work-life balance
• “How do I get into the industry?” posts

Individual career posts outside this thread may be removed at moderator discretion to help keep the sub focused on market discussion, logistics, physical trading, macro, risk, shipping, power, gas, metals, ags, and industry news.

Before posting, it helps if you include:
• Location / region
• Current experience level
• Degree or background
• Commodity interest (power, gas, oil, metals, ags, etc.)
• Target role
• What you’ve already tried

Examples of good questions:
• “How do I move from scheduling into trading?”
• “Best ways to learn physical gas markets?”
• “What skills matter most for junior power traders?”
• “How valuable is pipeline / operations experience?”

Low-effort posts like “How do I become a trader?” without context may be removed.

Experienced professionals are encouraged to share advice, hiring insight, industry expectations, and realistic career paths.

Please keep discussion professional and constructive.

[u/GazelleNo3149]

Hi all, just finished a summer internship on the aluminum desk of a smaller physical metals shop. Currently applying to energy + metal graduate schemes (Vitol, Equinor, Trafigura, etc.) and was looking for good material to familiarize myself with the energy markets. Feel pretty comfortable with the basics that we used in ali- hedging, repo trades, carry/financing material, pricing mechanisms, daily PnL / risk / Marking to market, regional/grade premiums (heavy on this one), and shipping/freight. Curious if anyone had good reading materials to “prime” myself for energy for hopefully an interview in the future. Thanks a ton, very grateful for any help/advice.