Crude tops investor commodities picks Crude oil is the top pick among commodities investors for 2012, followed by gold and copper, while natural gas is expected to be the worst performer, according to a survey by a leading commodities investment bank. Barclays Capital, which polled more than 100 institutions, also noted that investors still valued commodities as a way of diversifying their portfolios. After a "soft" 2011, which saw institutions cutting their exposure to oil, corn and metals, it expected investment flows to rebound in 2012. "The demand to increase direct commodity exposure over the next three years is high," said Kevin Norrish, commodities strategist at BarCap. Commodities prices have rallied since the start of 2012, helped by the jump in crude oil on rising Iran tensions. The benchmark price gauge, the Reuters/Jefferies CRB index, has risen almost 7 per cent since the beginning of January, but some analysts said many investors still remained cautious after the volatility in commodities markets in 2011. The BarCap survey revealed enthusiasm towards commodities. Although general aversion to risk in all growth sensitive assets was the reason more than 60 per cent of respondents gave for cutting their weightings in commodities, more than half said that they would initiate or increase commodity exposure in the next three years. More than 20 per cent of investors polled during January and February said they expected crude oil to perform most strongly, with gold coming in second with 16 per cent of the vote and copper at third with 13 per cent. On the negative side, 31 per cent of institutions forecast US natural gas would perform badly. Investors seemed divided on grains, which came in second on the worst performing list with 14 per cent of the vote, but at fifth on the best performing list. Gold also divided investors, coming in at third on the worst performing list with 11 per cent of the vote. The banks" institutional clients have had a mixed record with their 2011 predictions. They correctly chose crude oil as the top performer in last year's survey, but also selected gold as the likely worst performer, which came in the second best after oil. Their precious metals predictions were "rather wide of the mark," said Mr Norrish, adding that there was "an unjustified level of pessimism on gold and over-optimism on the platinum group metals."