"How to Make Big Money in Small Markets: Commodities"

Following up on the post immediately below, "Catching The Big Trends: "Four Decades Of Disinflation"", a repost from December 2013:

How to Make Big Money in Small Markets: Commodities

Small that is compared to forex or treasuries.
There is no magic secret, just bet the multi-year trends and be right.
From October's "Commodity hedge funds face bleak future":

The thing I don't get about these whiny little commod (no 'e', yet) artists is the apparent failure to understand the words hedge or macro.

Dudes, you can go long or short. And do it in multiple, disparate commodities anywhere in the world.
Unless of course the folks who were proclaiming commodities an asset class were simply full of it and were nothing more than longside trend followers charging alpha sized 2-and-20 for what was actually leveraged beta....

The directional trade for most commodities has been down for at least two years so price action alone would have guided you. Stepping up to the junior analyst level of granularity, a look at mining company (for example) capital expenditures over the last decade tells you to beware of supply/demand imbalances.

The next level, analyst or assistant fund manager, has you looking at global macro: Worldwide demand for most everything is satiated.

Finally, at the really old guy level you do the pattern recognition thing, "Say this reminds me of the agricultural depression of 1920" and go take a nap.

Well there you go. There is no magic secret, just bet the multi-year trends and be right.
And recognize the change when it happens.