Darrell Fletcher - Commodity Volatility & the 2026 Outlook: Silver Spikes, Natural Gas Chaos

The KE Report Jan 28, 2026

Summary

Natural gas spiked from $5.80 to $7.30 in hours on Permian and Haynesville freeze-offs and a February contract rollover.

Silver's parabolic run from $50 to $117/oz looks more like momentum speculation than fundamentals, the guest argues.

Copper is trending toward $6/lb on supply deficits; tin and aluminum are forecast in deficit too.

Fletcher's 2026 macro themes include supply-chain regionalization, geopolitical tariffs, weather volatility, and a weaker U.S. dollar.

Rising clearing-house margins and commodity index rebalances have not slowed the rotation into hard assets.

Top takeaway Fletcher argues the 2026 natural gas spike is weather-driven but exposes a tighter structural backdrop: LNG exports near 20 BCF/day plus AI-driven power demand, with intraday moves from $5.80 to $7.30/MMBtu as the February contract rolls into March.
He warns storage could pull 900 BCF to 1 TCF over three weeks, pushing end-of-season inventories back toward roughly 22-year lows if February stays cold.
Fletcher is constructive on copper around $6 on a forecast 2026 supply deficit, noting COMEX is still in contango and the deficit should spill into tin and aluminum.
On silver, which has run from about $50 in late November 2025 to roughly $117 by late January 2026, Fletcher calls it a one-way momentum trade and says he favors gold over silver for 2026 given the parabolic move.
Fletcher's 2026 macro themes carry over from 2025: accelerating supply-chain control and regionalization, power and infrastructure buildouts drawing gas and industrial metals, persistent geopolitical and tariff risk, weather-driven volatility, a weaker US dollar, and continued rotation into hard assets.

Top takeaway Fletcher cites his colleague Marc Chandler as expecting another year of US dollar weakness in 2026, similar to the roughly 9% decline seen in 2025, framing it as a continued tailwind for commodities.