Black swans go from "once in ten years" to "attack in groups"? Commodities enter an era of extreme shock
As the shipping situation in the Gulf region's maritime chokepoint continues to deteriorate, more and more Wall Street trading departments have recently issued warnings about the physical commodity market... Goldman Sachs, RBC Capital Markets, JPMorgan Chase and other institutions have warned this month that the continued tightening of physical supply and demand may push Brent crude oil to stabilize at the three-digit mark; if supply disruptions evolve further, oil prices cannot be ruled out for a sharp surge. Eric Lee, senior commodities strategist at Citigroup, also joined the discussion last week.
As shipping conditions in the Gulf region's maritime chokepoint continue to worsen, a growing number of Wall Street trading desks have issued warnings about physical commodities markets in recent days... Goldman Sachs, RBC Capital Markets, JPMorgan Chase and other institutions have warned this month that the continued tightening of physical supply and demand may push Brent crude oil to stabilize at the three-digit mark; if supply disruptions evolve further, oil prices cannot be ruled out for a sharp surge. Eric Lee, senior commodities strategist at Citigroup, also joined the discussion last week. He warned that commodity markets have entered an era of near-constant volatility, with exogenous shocks brought about by geopolitics, climate change and technological revolutions increasingly overpowering traditional supply and demand analysis. Commodity markets are in a new era where geopolitical, climatic and technological shocks frequently overwhelm traditional supply and demand analysis. Investors must not just stick to "high probability events", but should also consider in depth those very reasonable tail risks and potential scenarios for which the market is currently least prepared. Looking at market dynamics, the frequency of major commodity supply disruptions has shown a significant upward trend. Extreme shocks that were once characterized as "once in ten years" have now become the norm every other year or even every six months. Looking back at history, the market has encountered the global financial crisis, the Arab Spring, the U.S. shale oil revolution, and OPEC's strategic policy shifts since the early 2000s; and since 2020, "black swan" events have followed one after another, including the outbreak of the new crown epidemic, the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the escalation of the trade war, macro risk concerns that are good for gold, the supply of agricultural products caused by extreme weather, and the Middle East conflict that normalizes geopolitical games. The figure below shows the timeline of major black swan and impact events that have had a profound impact on global commodity markets from 2000 to 2026: Regarding the macro outlook for the second half of 2026 and beyond, Lee sorted out nine uncertain factors that are highly destructive to the commodity market. He specifically reminded that although these scenarios are not baseline forecasts, their potential destructive power is extremely severe and they are tail risks that investors must not ignore: ① The U.S.-Iran conflict will evolve from a temporary shock to a disruption of oil production capacity in the Gulf region that will last for several years, pushing crude oil prices to over $150/barrel, wholesale refined oil prices to over $200/barrel, and causing U.S. retail gasoline prices to remain at a high of $6/gallon for a long time. ② The escalation of the situation between Russia and Ukraine has led to the resumption of oil and gas export restrictions: This has a bullish boost to the global natural gas market, which may even exceed that of crude oil. ③ The hoarding of key minerals in various countries has entered a white-hot stage: driving copper prices to US$20,000 per ton and above. ④Gold will fall another 15%-20% in the short term, and then double in price. ⑤ Frequent occurrence of super El Niño phenomena and other extreme weather: triggering skyrocketing prices of agricultural products - for example, the price of cocoa has once again soared to more than 10,000 US dollars per ton. ⑥The prosperity and bubble bursting of the artificial intelligence wave: On the one hand, it will greatly reshape the demand pattern for power infrastructure metals such as electricity, natural gas, uranium, copper and aluminum, and on the other hand, it will have an opposite impact on the trend of gold. ⑦ The trade war hits U.S. farmers hard again: The renewed trade war has impacted U.S. agricultural exports and may cause corn prices to fall below $4.2/bushel and soybean prices to fall below $10/bushel. ⑧With the Russian "Power of Siberia 2" natural gas pipeline transmitting gas to China, the global LNG surplus situation may intensify in 2030: driving global LNG prices such as JKM (Asia Benchmark Price) to fall to US$5-6/million British thermal units. ⑨ The "Monroe Doctrine" went to extremes: The United States blocked oil exports throughout the Americas, causing global oil prices to soar to more than $100 per barrel, and the U.S. benchmark oil price may be discounted by more than $30 per barrel. It is worth noting that the trend of the Bloomberg Commodity Index, which has been widely watched in the industry, can be found that this broad commodity price index, which covers energy, agricultural products, metals and livestock industries, is still continuing the volatile upward trend since the low point of the new crown epidemic.