I know people who made millions day trading commodities, for no one in that cohort to have made any real money over two years is surprising to the point of disbelief. This may be something particular to the Brazilian exchange.
What makes commodities easier to trade?
Ed Seykota has been doing it for decades:
You’ll quickly get big or go home.
(However trading on embargoed government press releases is illegal. Though rather than kidnapping Clarence Beeks on the train, you can just interview the Florida farmers yourself.)
You would definitely have an advantage in trading oil/gas futures if you had access to ExxonMobil's seismic exploration reports, for example.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/opinion/articles/2018-10-24/it...
But the insider trading you suggest above, is predicated on having material non public information of ExxonMobil’s.
IMO the main difference is that, while in both cases you'll see a small number of successes and a huge number of failures, in startup land the net expected value is positive while in day trader land it is negative.