"All the people I’ve seen who went into carbon trading have failed and moved out"

Global Carbon Credits Die as Smart Money Sees Profits Trading India's RECs - Bloomberg

The latest casualties of the death of the Kyoto plan may be the companies and executives who bet their careers and their capital that credits to release carbon into the environment would become a globally traded commodity to rival the $21 trillion market in crude oil. So far, the carbon market is a comparative blip on the landscape. Banks and brokers traded 93 billion euros ($128 billion) of carbon credits last year, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

“All the people I’ve seen who went into carbon trading have failed and moved out,” says Jason Kennedy, chief executive officer of London-based headhunter Kennedy Associates. “There’s not enough volume, not enough pay and not enough investment.”

Even some pilot programs are being shut down.