Dave Fry is the founder and editor of ETF Digest, a subscription-based newsletter that focuses on technical analysis of the ETF market. His picks and pans, driven by trend-following analysis, include a close review of the commodities market.

Dave spoke with the editors of HardAssetsInvestor.com about the outlook for the commodities market in 2009.

HardAssetsInvestor.com (HAI): What should commodity investors expect in 2009?

Dave Fry, editor, ETF Digest (Fry): Well, I will stick to my long-held commitment: I don't make forecasts. I don't think it's a profitable thing to do.

Instead, I'm a trend follower. I go with the trends. And right now, in the commodities markets, the trends have been down and it has been profitable to be short. I think, however, that we're probably at a turning point of some kind. When I look at commodities from a technical point of view, most commodities are forming what I might call a "diving board" platform: They are starting to move sideways, working off their oversold conditions. From here, they could either spring higher, or spring lower.

HAI: So what was your advice to investors in 2008?

Fry: Well, 2008 was a Matterhorn year for commodities. We had sharp rallies in most commodities in the first half of 2008, and then a fall. Investors need to follow those trends. If you were able to get out anywhere near the top this summer by following the trends, you were able to lock up nice gains and get short in some areas.

Unfortunately, for ETF investors, it can be pretty hard to short some commodities or commodity-related ETFs, such as the Market Vectors - Steel ETF (NYSE: SLX). If you're not an institutional investor, you can't really short them. And there, you just have to stand aside. It's the best you can do.

HAI: So what are you telling clients to consider now?

Fry: Well, with the exception of oil and perhaps coal, we're in a trendless period as I mentioned earlier: the diving board formation. We're just moving along at the bottom, trending sideways, waiting for demand to increase to support these commodities.

The different commodities have different outlooks. In the spring, we'll hit the growing season in grains, and people will be sensitive to that, so volatility will increase in Agriculture markets.

In Industrial Metals, copper is the key, and we're waiting to see if it can find some kind of base. I thought it would hold at $150, but it went to $125. People in the market refer to copper as "Doctor Copper," because it's such a critical metal. When people want to know what the economy is doing globally, they look at copper, and right now it has not been looking very good.

With crude oil, I don't know what to say about it. They keep cutting production, and people keep cutting consumption. Until consumption increases, I think oil will probably just stay flat. Some people are calling for $25/barrel oil. We'll see.

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