They know.
They’re just trying to squeeze every last dollar out of us no matter the cost to the planet and the next thousand generations of human beings.
But the laws of markets are as inexorable as gravity .
Hedge funds are betting against oil stocks and winding back shorts on solar in a reversal of positions that dominated their energy strategies over the past four years.
Since the beginning of October and through the second quarter, equity-focused hedge funds have — on average — been mostly short oil stocks, according to a Bloomberg Green analysis of positions on companies in global indexes for sectors spanning oil, wind, solar and electric vehicles. That’s a reversal of bets that had dominated since 2021, according to the data, which are based on fund disclosures to Hazeltree, an alternative-investment data specialist.
Over the same period, funds have unwound short bets against solar stocks. The analysis, which is based on a universe of some 700 hedge funds representing about $700 billion in gross assets also shows that portfolio managers have stayed net long wind in the period.
There has been “a bottoming out with some of these clean energy plays,” said Todd Warren, portfolio manager at Tribeca Investment Partners Pty. That trend has “really occurred at the same time as we’ve seen — in the oil patch — some concerns with regards to supply and demand balance,” he said.
The analysis shows that more hedge funds were, on average, net short stocks in the S&P Global Oil Index than net long for seven of the nine months starting October 2024. By contrast, net longs exceeded net shorts in all but eight of the 45 months from January 2021 through September 2024.
The development coincides with a rise in oil supply as some OPEC+ member nations act to preserve their market share. Joe Mares, a portfolio manager at Trium Capital, a hedge fund managing about $3.5 billion, notes that ratcheting up output has “not historically been great” for the oil industry. Evidence of an economic slowdown in the US and China, combined with an expectation that global oil inventories will continue to rise through the rest of 2025, means there’s growing skepticism toward the sector.
Once investors take in “the general slowdown in everything,” the question then becomes, “who’s buying the oil?” said Kerry Goh, Singapore-based chief investment officer at Kamet Capital Partners Pte.
Greenwich, Connecticut-based Tall Trees Capital Management LP is short oil stocks because “we see much lower oil prices, especially in 2026,” said Lisa Audet, the fund’s founder and chief investment officer.
Investors may get further insight into the supply-demand balance as early as this week, with OPEC set to release its monthly market analysis. Updates are also due from the US Energy Information Administration and the International Energy Agency. On Monday, oil held close to two-month lows.
In the US, meanwhile, President Donald Trump’s quest to add supply in an effort to bring down the price of oil has unsettled local producers.
The Dallas Fed’s latest quarterly energy survey, published on July 2, shows negative sentiment among oil companies toward the Trump administration’s policy on the fossil fuel. One respondent in the anonymized study said the administration’s implied price target of $50 a barrel is simply unsustainable for the industry. Another spoke of the “chaos” caused by current US trade policies, adding the volatility will drive companies to “lay down rigs.”
Innovators and early adopters test new products first, but the critical adoption range lies between about 5% and 15%. At this stage, small changes quietly accumulate, laying the foundation for rapid, widespread transitions. Observing these subtle yet significant shifts can help policymakers, businesses, and consumers anticipate and adapt to broader market transformations.
The 5% to 15% adoption window matters because it signals the transition from niche interest to mainstream acceptance. Before this period, technologies are viewed primarily as experiments or curiosities. Crossing the 5% threshold indicates enough momentum to begin shifting infrastructure, policy, and consumer attitudes. For example, in the early days of smartphones, Apple’s first iPhone launched in 2007 and quickly captivated a small group of enthusiastic buyers. However, broader adoption remained limited until around 2010, when smartphone penetration crossed approximately 15%. After this threshold, widespread mobile networks, better app availability, and falling prices helped smartphones rapidly replace traditional mobile phones.
Similar patterns emerged in digital photography. Early digital cameras in the late 1990s and early 2000s were expensive and produced inferior image quality compared to film cameras. Initially, only professional photographers and technology enthusiasts adopted digital cameras. Around 2004, digital camera sales surpassed approximately 15% of the total camera market, prompting companies to expand digital product lines rapidly. Soon after, film camera infrastructure — photo labs, film manufacturing, and chemical processing — began declining sharply as digital photography accelerated into the mainstream.
In automotive electrification, infrastructure often provides the earliest measurable sign of impending change. For example, the Netherlands illustrates clearly how charging infrastructure signals broader transitions. In 2013, when electric vehicles represented around 2% of new car sales, the country had fewer than 5,000 public and semi-private charging points. By 2018, when EV adoption reached about 10%, the number of chargers increased dramatically, exceeding 35,000 nationwide. This rapid infrastructure rollout significantly reduced consumer concerns about charging convenience, accelerating further adoption.
Germany followed a similar trajectory. Initially cautious, the German government began actively investing in public charging infrastructure around 2015, even though electric vehicles made up less than 2% of new car sales at the time. By 2020, EV adoption grew to about 7%, driven largely by infrastructure support, including extensive charging networks along major highways and in urban areas. Early infrastructure investments in Germany demonstrated to consumers and businesses alike that electric vehicles were becoming practical rather than experimental.
Norway provides perhaps the clearest early example. As early as 2008, when EV sales were under 5%, Norwegian cities like Oslo began systematically installing public chargers in parking garages, municipal buildings, and public spaces. By the time EV adoption exceeded 15% around 2015, Norway’s early infrastructure investment had already established a practical charging network, making further growth much easier and faster than elsewhere in Europe.
Beyond infrastructure, targeted government policies also mark the early adoption window. These policies typically include direct subsidies, tax incentives, and regulatory privileges to encourage early buyers. Germany introduced direct purchase subsidies of about €4,000 per vehicle in 2016, helping EV adoption climb from under 2% in 2016 to nearly 7% by 2020. In the Netherlands, tax incentives significantly reduced the cost of buying and operating EVs starting around 2014, accelerating adoption and making electric vehicles more attractive than internal combustion alternatives in urban settings.
I see Ed Hirs’ uses “tariff wars” as a euphemism for Trumps stupid unilateral tariffs.
Sam Evans’ “Gas Cars Will Disappear From The United States Sooner Than You Think” is poorly phrased. The map of dates shows when states will hit peak ICE cars, and they’re likely to have a long tail in some areas, probably fed by a cheap supply of otherwise unsellable ICE vehicles.
Ten years ago, I thought that old US ICE cars would be shipped to some other country as Americans started to adopt EVs. Chinese manufacturers and US presidents have flipped that on its head, as China is helping large portions of the world make the transition, making the US the straggler in the world market.