Bakken Economy Update, The Williston Wire; 70% Of California Physicians Do Not Participate In ObamaCare; 70% Is A Failing Grade; 360 Million Americans, Maybe 4 Million Signed Up For ObamaCare -- October 29, 2014

"They didn't build the following businesses" according to Hillary, but the following were noted by the Williston Wire:

New owners celebrate grand opening of Walt's Market. This is a big story for me. It is just down the street from where my dad lives on University Avenue. It's claim to fame: some of the best beef in state of North Dakota in the US.  When I was younger, I remember my dad stopping at Walt's Market to pick up some of the best beef in town. I'm glad to see it's going to be re-invented.

"They didn't build it" but Sherwin-Williams is opening a new store in Williston. It's a 5,800-square-foot facility at 2112 4th Avenue West.

"They won't build it" but Culver's will celebrate a ground breaking on November 10, 2014, which will be located just west of Buffalo Wild Wings. The address: 401 Reiger Driver. Culver's is a Wisconsin-based restaurant recognized for its homemade butterburgers and fresh frozen custard. I wonder if Hillary will take credit for the cooking?

"They didn't build it," but Sanford will donate $1 million to Watford City's new medical center.

In this case, I think he really did build it -- an Arkansas man converts a yellow-school bus to a BBQ truck in Ray.

Fifteen cultural economics students from Denmark spent three weeks studying and touring North Dakota, driving on roads provided by the government.

Wow, it's amazing how much "they didn't build."

How does one spell cockamamie?

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$100 oil?

I'm not really in the mood to do much with this article. I will note just one or two data points. Bloomberg is posting:

Global consumption will grow to 99 million barrels a day in 2019 from 92.8 million this year, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency. While the U.S. is producing the most oil since 1985 as it taps shale-rock formations and OPEC production grew at the fastest rate in 13 months in September, future demand will require supply from areas with high costs, such as the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico or the Arctic.

Prices may rebound well before 2020. Brent, the global benchmark, will climb to as much as $100 a barrel next year, according to Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., Standard Chartered and Barclays Plc. 

This is not an investment site. Do not make any investment, financial, or relationship decisions based on what you read here but this is another once-in-a-lifetime investing opportunity from my point of view. That and a $1.00 will get you a small drink at McDonald's.

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Hess Will Stick With $6 Billion Stampede Project In The Gulf

Rigzone is reporting:

U.S. independent oil company Hess Corp. said on Tuesday it would proceed with the development of the $6 billion Stampede project in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, one of the biggest energy investments announced during the current oil price slump.

Hess, the operator of the deepwater project, has a 25 percent stake in Stampede. A unit of Chevron Corp, Norway's Statoil and Nexen Petroleum Offshore will also each hold a 25 percent stake.

Hess said first production from the project is expected in 2018.

Total estimated recoverable resources for Stampede, located about 115 miles south of Fourchon, Louisiana, are estimated in the range of 300 million to 350 million barrels of oil equivalent. Gross processing capacity for the Stampede project is some 80,000 barrels of oil per day.

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This Ship Has Sailed

The New York Times is reporting:

At a time when the Obama administration is lurching from crisis to crisis — a new Cold War in Europe, a brutal Islamic caliphate in the Middle East and a deadly epidemic in West Africa, to name just the most obvious ones — it is not surprising that long-term strategy would take a back seat. But it raises inevitable questions about the ability of the president and his hard-pressed national security team to manage and somehow get ahead of the daily onslaught of events.

The biggest problem it seems is this: the problems keep piling up because no one makes a decision. With regard to protecting the military, the US Army couldn't wait for any decision from the commander-in-chief. The US Army, unilaterally, set its own policy on Ebola: quarantining 100% of the troops returning from west Africa. They even picked the location for quarantine. I assume other agencies will make their own ad hoc decisions in lieu of directions from the Oval Office.

Heartaches by the number, troubles by the score, every day you love me less, each day I love you more :

Ray Price, Heartaches By The Number

I wonder if they've picked out the Christmas tree yet?

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ObamaCare

I love this. I have opined from the beginning that the ObamaCare numbers were inflated. The official numbers are in the 8 million range; many observers suggest a more realistic number is closer to 4 million. I've opined that it may be around 2 million that are actually happy they enrolled demonstrated by the fact that they: a) are paying their premiums on time; and, b) will re-enroll.

It turns out I may not be far off. IBD via Yahoo!Finance is reporting:

The Obama administration's tally of 7.3 million paid enrollees in ObamaCare exchange plans as of mid-August increasingly looks like an artificial peak that hasn't been sustained.

The most telling data point since the Department of Health and Human Services announced exchange membership last month comes from California, where the 1.4 million sign-ups as of mid-April have dwindled to just over 1.1 million paying customers — a drop of 20.3%.

That decline is on the same scale as in Florida, where insurer rate filings in June showed 763,000 exchange plan members, down 22.5% from the 984,000 sign-ups reported by HHS.

And it looks like consumers are not the only ones dropping out/opting out. CNS News is reporting:

Over 214,000 doctors won't participate in the new plans under the Affordable Care Act (ACA,) analysis of a new survey by Medical Group Management Association shows.

That number of 214,524, estimated by American Action Forum, is through May 2014, but appears to be growing due to plans that force doctors to take on burdensome costs. It's also about a quarter of the total number of 893,851 active professional physicians reported by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

In January, an estimated 70% of California's physicians were not participating in Covered California plans.

We had the same problem with Tricare when I was in the military. Initially, providers and health care insurers were eager to compete for military healthcare contracts, but when they saw the 5-inch thick contracts with incomprehensible legalese and unreachable goals, most quickly dropped out. It was miserable for the first three or four years of Tricare for the Department of Defense to find physicians and health insurers who would sign on. 

I honestly did not think there would be this much difficulty finding physicians for ObamaCare, and had 20% opted out, I would not have been surprised. But I would have been surprised had the number gotten to 35%. I am astounded that 70% of California physicians have opted out. Remember, this is the most liberal state in the union, now.

By the way, most of ObamaCare has not yet kicked in. Most of ObamaCare was delayed or waived by executive order and won't kick in until 2015 or 2016 or later. That's why we don't hear much about ObamaCare any more and why those who want to see it repealed haven't said much about it. It will simply die on the vine. Insurers will cherry pick; investors will do very, very well; but it won't change things much for those who did not win life's lottery as Hillary would say.

By the way, one has to ask the next question: who are the 3 out of 10 physicians in California who have elected to participate in ObamaCare? My hunch is they are the physicians, who for whatever reason, are having trouble maintaining a practice for lack of patients. In the early early days of Tricare it seemed the military was not able to sign up the best and the brightest. The best and the brightest are not short of patients.