‘Everybody’s going to be green again with inflation back down’: Ex–Goldman commodities guru Jeff Currie rips environmentalists ‘unwilling to pay for their politics’

That’s the tune the market will sing this year, claims Jeff Currie, a famous “commodities guru” who stepped down from his role as head of commodities research at Goldman Sachs last August, ending a storied 27-year career at the investment bank. Even now, Currie remains one of the most respected commodities experts in the world—and he sees the green landscape of pre-inflation times returning, with energy prices set to rise in 2024. 

Since 2020, Currie, who now serves as chair of the advisory board at the University of Chicago Energy Policy Institute, has warned that commodities will experience a “supercycle” driven by three key factors—redistributional policies, environmental policies, and deglobalization. And, in a further echo of the New Order classic, he told Bloomberg on Monday that “everybody’s going to be green again with inflation back down.” 

It all has to do with one big takeaway from the huge spurt of inflation in 2021 and 2022, Currie said, and one big call he got wrong. Green energy supporters “were unwilling to pay for their politics,” and that meant energy prices didn’t spike as Currie forecasted.

He blamed this on politicians’ flip-flops on green policies worldwide, as well as several other factors, but warned Monday that the era of fading commodity prices won’t last. 

Green when inflation is low, not so much with high inflation

Before the world was hit with a wave of inflation in 2021, green energy policies were front and center for President Biden. In 2019, Biden, then a leading Democratic candidate in the presidential race, promised to “end fossil fuel” after activists challenged him for accepting donations from…