I was recently offered a summer internship at an oil major at a certain location, my home town, in their natural gas trading program and accepted it. I am extremely excited about the opportunity! But, I have always been interested in crude oil. Maybe I am a little biased; as I took a certificate program in Global Oil & Gas Management that was strongly focused in crude? Since then, I have been doing quite a bit of reading into the news and the process of crude trading. But, upon receiving my internship offer, I found out that their crude trading is actually at a different location than their nat gas trading for this major. I was hoping to get to touch a few different commodities before having to pick one commodity career path over another.
I guess what I am asking is:
What are some of the biggest differences in a day in the life of crude trading vs nat gas trading and career potential? (I once found an article that really dug into this topic but haven't been able to find it again)
Would it be frowned upon to ask if I could be transferred to a different location to see what crude would be like if I am offered a position into their graduate program?
Any other advice or insights?
Thanks
Former gas trader here so my opinion is obviously biased. In my opinion gas is the better market to trade. You have better availability of data; so much so that you can model the entire North American system. There is better volatility in locational pricing as gas can only be moved by pipeline. While crude can experience good differentials due to the marginal molecule being moved by pipe, truck or rail the day to day vol doesn't tend to be as fun. Plus crude (and product) pipelines have the exact opposite transparency to gas.
Short answer for biggest differences? Nat gas trader sits around all day and worries about weather. Crude trader sits around all day and worries about gdp growth, geopolitics and opec.