In our last blog, 9 Essential Traits of Successful Commodity Traders, we looked at the characteristics required to survive in this tough but rewarding industry. But these qualities alone aren’t enough. To thrive, you need concrete practices, habits, and principles.
Drawing on conversations with some of the world’s leading commodity traders and executives from The Strong Source podcast, here are ten top tips for success, insights we gathered from guests like Martijn Noordhoek, Kristine Hochbaum, Rob Gosman, Kendra Rhodes, David Behrends, and many more…
1. Master the fundamentals before everything else
Before you worry about models, algorithms, or “gut feel,” you need to understand the building blocks of your market. Time and again, guests stressed the power of supply, demand, and price relationships.
Fausto Filice, a veteran wheat trader, emphasized this point when discussing advice for newcomers: “My advice is to learn the basics. I think people try to already over-speculate on futures, just looking at charts and looking at momentum. That’s fine, but for me, I don’t consider that a very good base for trading. You need to put in the time learning about the markets that you’re trading. Supply and demand is still the basic, our markets still work on supply and demand.”
In sugar, Martijn Noordhoek noticed a split that only becomes obvious once you live inside the fundamentals: “White sugar trades very much like a soft commodity, but once you move into raw sugar it compares itself much better to corn or grains. You only understand that once you’ve really gone into the fundamentals of how each market trades.”
Dwight Anderson reinforced this wisdom: “Fundamentals in the end always matter. Like if I take coffee to 3.35 cents a pound, it’s going to a buck and a quarter. The path and the risk management and the timing is the real critical variable, but you can’t change the inordinate level of supply and demand.”
Fundamentals aren’t the first thing to learn; they’re the last thing you can ever forget!
2. Immerse yourself in the physical markets
Books and screens can only take you so far. Many of our guests spoke passionately about getting close to the source of the commodity: farms, factories, ports, and warehouses.
Willem Zimmerman found that out on day one. Fresh out of university and eager to start his career, he thought he’d sit behind screens analyzing charts. Instead, his new employer had different plans: “They took my passport and said: next week we’ll send you to Ivory Coast. You can return when you think you understand the value chain.”
After four weeks in the field, something clicked. “That was really the way of learning. I got super excited about being exposed and really feeling part of that business,” Willem recalled.
Kendra Rhodes had her own on-the-ground spark at a soybean processing plant, talking to farmers on the merchandising desk and buying beans directly: “That was the spark where I thought: gosh, this is cool. No day was the same.”
Immersion brings commodities to life. It grounds your analysis in reality and helps you sense shifts before they hit the data.
3. Spend time shadowing, not just reading
Several of our guests emphasized that their biggest breakthroughs came not from textbooks but from sitting next to veterans and watching them work.
Kristine Hochbaum, who built an impressive 19-year career at Cargill, shared how she fought her way into trading: “I spent every waking moment learning from traders, finding projects to get on with them so I could start to understand. I put my stake out there that I wanted to be a trader.”
Rob Gosman, with over 30 years in energy trading, put it even more bluntly when discussing what young traders should do: “If you get on the trading floor, just pump the shit out of those people, asking questions until they’re sick of you, buying beers until they can’t tell you any more stories, because those are the people who will teach you things you could never learn on your own.”
Shadowing shows you how professionals think in real time, how they manage uncertainty, and how they react when things go sideways. As Rob puts it, you absorb more than any textbook could ever teach.
4. Always have very clear risk management procedures
Throughout our conversations, one message came through loud and clear from veteran traders: risk management separates professionals from gamblers. You can’t control market direction, but you can control how much you’re willing to lose.
As our host Martijn Bron recalls, “One of the best risk management policies I ever read was written by Ed Turner himself,” the man behind Mandara’s legendary trading framework and the discipline that earned him widespread respect.
But risk management isn’t just about fancy VAR models or position limits. Denis Zaica explained how real risk awareness starts at ground level: “You quickly realize: what exactly am I buying? What can go wrong? Maybe counterpart risk, maybe execution risk, maybe mark-to-market exposure. That’s when you start to form your opinion.”
The best traders don’t chase the upside first. They build systems that protect them on the downside, ensuring they live to trade another day. As Kendra Rhodes puts it, “In essence, it’s about helping customers manage their price risk, not betting on direction.”
Successful traders don’t chase the upside first. They build systems that protect them on the downside.
5. Don’t be dogmatic, always stay critical
Markets evolve. What worked yesterday may not work tomorrow. Staying flexible and questioning your own assumptions is vital.
For Kristine Hochbaum, adaptability kept opening doors: “Every time I came back from maternity leave, I ended up with a bigger job, because I never assumed the old way was the only way. You always have to adapt.”
Stephane Bernard, head of commodity trading at ETG applied the same mindset early in the 2000s. While others were just looking at charts, he was already developing systematic trading strategies: “I was already developing systematic strategies because I didn’t believe one style of trading was enough.”
The best traders aren’t attached to a single theory or approach. They’re constantly testing, questioning, and adjusting their methods based on new market conditions.
6. Embrace failure as your teacher
Every trader faces losses and disappointments. The difference between the successful ones and the rest is how you respond to them.
Willem Zimmerman put it simply: “When you lose, don’t lose the lesson.” It’s about reflecting on what went wrong in a trade, understanding why, and ensuring you don’t repeat the same error. Rob Gosman echoed the same idea, reminding us that “mistakes aren’t mistakes if you learn from them, they’re actually investments.”
The traders who last in this business are those who embrace failure as their teacher, not their enemy.
7. Make confident decisions with incomplete information
In commodities, you never have all the data you want. Perfect information is a luxury that doesn’t exist in real markets.
As Marc Perathoner observed: “As a trader, you take decisions with a certain degree of uncertainty because you don’t have all the information. That’s why risk management is so important, it’s what you do after you took the decision that matters.”
The successful traders we’ve spoken to have learned to make confident decisions despite uncertainty. They’ve developed frameworks and processes that help them act decisively when others are paralyzed by incomplete information.
8. Match risk appetite with accountability
Big swings demand full ownership.
On Cargill’s Geneva floor, the culture was exacting: “It was a tough environment — very smart, challenging people. If you wanted to be there, you had to take responsibility for your positions,” recalls Alex Sanfeliu.
And the market itself keeps score, as Fausto Filice quips: “You can only get away with shorts and slippers in Geneva if you’re always making money. At the end of the day, the market keeps you accountable.”
This principle creates a natural balance: take the risks you want, but own the consequences completely. Courage without accountability becomes recklessness, and reckless traders don’t last long.
9. Develop unshakeable discipline
When chaos hits, discipline keeps you in the game. For Kristine Hochbaum, it was non-negotiable: “Trading discipline was something that my teams probably got a little sick of me saying, but we didn’t trade if our house wasn’t in order. If you have a question about your position, you have no business trading until you figure out what your position is.”
Process protects you, adds Kendra Rhodes: “You’ve gotta have a process in place… You can’t just be like, ‘oh shoot, now we’re changing the plan.’”
Ed Turner loved the Mike Tyson line because it matched reality: “Everyone’s got a plan until they get hit in the face. And that was my USP as a trader. I get hit in the face all the time and I can still stick to a plan and have a plan, but a lot of people, that’s not how they operate.”
10. Keep your network alive
Your network is one of your greatest assets in commodities. Relationships open doors, provide intelligence, and keep you grounded.
Rob Gosman, who now trades independently after decades at major firms, explained how his network keeps him sharp: “I’ve got 30 years of contacts in the markets. They keep me on the straight and narrow. They steer me when to stay out of trouble or whether my logic is sound.”
David Behrends shared a perfect example of how his career developed in the coffee industry: “It was through a friend of a friend of a friend that I ended up in Argentina. That’s how careers happen in this industry.”
Your relationships become one of your greatest trading assets. The commodity world is surprisingly small, and connections matter enormously.
🎧 Keep Learning from the Best
Every tip in this article came from real conversations with the best in the business.
We created The Strong Source Podcast to give you direct access to the thinking, experiences, and lessons of the world’s top traders, strategists, and CEOs.
The Commodity Podcast is available on all platforms Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Youtube Music, or Deezer.
