Tuesday Links -- Average Oil Prices Had Their Best Year Ever in 2012 -- WSJ

Active rigs: 189 (down a couple)

The Market: all green. Even oil is up a bit. The Bakken/WTI spread at Clearbrook, MN, hasn't changed in the past few days; still $3.25; for the average "Joe" -- parity. The WTI/Brent spread still about the same: $16. Energy is doing very well. I was surprised to see that the average price of oil was the best ever last year (2012; see story below). AAPL is now a momentum stock; up $12 in past two days. Retail investors and mutual funds will now be worried about missing this train. Oasis Petroleum is now larger (market cap) than S&P 500 component Allegheny Technologies. [Later, oil hits a four-month high. Why? Signs of global growth? Short squeeze? Easy money?]

Apple: just announced. Will launch a higher-storage iPad -- 128GB -- for a $100 premium; retinal display, fourth generation. Will launch February 5. This company is simply blowing away the competition. I had a short conversation with a real estate broker/agent the other day: he was new to the iPad. Said real estate agents can't survive without the iPad. I predicted that -- and blogged on it -- about 5,690 posts ago. I doubt if I could ever find that post. That will be true of several other "industries" -- depending on the iPad. By the way,  have you ever seen the Apple product placement in "30 Rock"? Something tells me Tina Fey has more revenue streams than one might imagine. Good for her. Her show is streamed live and for free almost immediately after it air. There's a reason for that, and "product placement" might be one of them.

Hess is up 10 percent today, after a pop yesterday. Pat myself on the back: I posted the Hess story before the market opened yesterday for those who might have been interested.  Disclaimer: this is not an investment site: don't make any investment decisions based on what you read here. The story on Hess is not a recommendation. I own no shares in Hess. Don sent me this link: a push to have Hess spin off its Bakken assets. Implications for others.

WSJ Links

Section D (Personal Journal): 
This is interesting: panel pushes vaccine for pregnant women; amid whooping cough crisis, new guidelines recommend mothers get vaccinated at each pregnancy.

Wow, a huge write-up on one of our favorite museums in New England: The Peabody Essex -- the museum has managed to defy conventional wisdom about museum funding.

Section C (Money & Investing): two interesting stories on "Heard on the Street":
A new foreign policy for Gazprom and Exxon: making something from nothing. The XOM story is an important one for investors. I might come back to it, but this pearl: Average oil prices had their best year ever in 2012. I would not have guessed that.

Section B (Marketplace): 
Another important article for investors: Chinese machines, US doubt -- an article on the world's sixth-largest construction-equipment company.

Patriot Coal seeks trust to limit retiree health costs: the trust would have a lifetime limit of $200 million, according to union lawsuit documents.

GM to invest $600 million on Kansas factory upgrade. Earlier today I posted a story about Kansas being one of three states looking to eliminate personal and corporate income taxes. Kansas is a right-to-work state. 

Section A:
Front page: This almost deserves a stand-alone post of its own: the web-deprived study at McDonald's. The lede:

Joshua Edwards's eighth-grade paper about the Black Plague came with a McDouble and fries. Joshua sometimes does his homework at a McDonald's restaurant --  not because he is drawn by the burgers, but because the fast-food chain is one of the few places in this southern Alabama city (Citronelle) of 4,000 where he can get online access free once the public library closes. 

Maybe later. There are a lot of story lines in that article.

Company with ties to Senator Reid saw its rival's Medicare payments slashed. Shocked. I'm shocked. Another "dog bites man" story.

Op-ed: to outsmart ObamaCare, go protean. Lots of story lines in this article also. Maybe later.

Op-ed: Courts? Who Listens to Courts? The NLRB tells the DC Circuit to take a hike.

Op-ed: Zero Dark Ethanol. 'Do a good job ... If you fail, we'll fine your customers.' What a great country.