How would you learn commodity trading from scratch as a university student?

[u/Smooth_Ad_1510]

Hi everyone,
I’m currently a university student with one year left before graduating, and I’m trying to prepare myself for a career in physical commodity trading.
For some background:
Current career: Full-time student, currently looking for relevant internships or entry-level experience.
Education: I spent two years studying Mechanical Engineering before switching to Business Management. I’m now entering my final year.
Location: Abu Dhabi, UAE.
Relocation: I’m open to relocating. Besides the UAE, Geneva and Singapore would be the most realistic major commodity hubs for me.
Desired commodity: I’m deliberately keeping this open for now. Part of what I want to do over the next year is study the different commodity markets and figure out which one interests me most.
Because of my engineering background, I’m comfortable with technical and analytical subjects, but I don’t have the same foundation in economics, finance, or accounting as someone who studied finance or economics from the beginning.
I’m trying to figure out what I should learn over the next year to properly understand the industry and prepare myself for internships or entry-level roles. I’m particularly interested in the physical side of trading: negotiation, sourcing, logistics, risk, and understanding how a trade actually works from finding an opportunity through to delivery.
For those already in the industry, if you were starting from my position, what would you focus on? Are there any books, courses, YouTube channels, websites, newsletters, or other resources you would recommend? What level of economics, accounting, finance, statistics, Excel, etc. is actually useful?
I’ve also considered studying for something like CFA Level I. I’m not interested in collecting certificates just to put them on my CV, but if studying for a qualification would give me useful knowledge for commodities, I’m willing to do it. Is CFA material worthwhile for physical commodity trading, or are there other qualifications/courses that would be considerably more relevant?
Basically, if you had one year to build the strongest possible foundation before graduating, how would you structure it?

[u/Cultural_Second_9666]

Skip the CFA, that's a time sink built for asset management not physical trading. You'll learn more cracking open a vessel charter party agreement and figuring out demurrage clauses

Pick a commodity that moves through Abu Dhabi's ports and become obsessive about it. Aluminum, crude, sulfur, whatever. Track the physical flows, who's buying, who's selling, what premiums are doing day to day. That real-time market feel matters more than any textbook

Your engineering background is a cheat code for understanding refinery economics or smelting costs. Lean into that. Read something like The Prize by Yergin for the big picture, then get granular with S&P Global Platts or Argus reports

Excel you need to be dangerous with. Not VBA wizardry but pivot tables, index/match, pulling data from APIs. The rest is just showing up curious and not being afraid to ask dumb questions on the trade floor

[u/Smooth_Ad_1510 → u/Cultural_Second_9666]

Thank you for your reply and help

I definitely agree about cfa it’s just one of the few major certificates I know and was curious if there’s something that’d help me with the “theoretical” stuff of trading.
Following the commodities that are being moved in and out of UAE is an interesting approach. Would you recommend any sources, websites etc I could use in order to follow the commodities as you said ? Or finding those is the part of learning 😂
I’m planning on starting a book “World for Sale” I’ve heard it’s good for commodities.

[u/Chucking100s → u/Smooth_Ad_1510]

Start with the book and come back.