Oasis Helling Trust Wells Updated (No New News); Chrysler Sales Up Almost 20%; ObamaEconomy A Bust, But That's Okay -- Reuters; October 1, 2014

The NDIC daily activity report for yesterday has now been posted. A couple of observations. A reader told me just yesterday to watch the Zavanna wells east of Williston; two more Zavanna wells were reported at completed and producing in yesterday's report. In addition, SM Energy reports a couple of nice wells, and even OXY USA has a pretty good well.

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Oasis Helling Trust Wells Update (not much new)

I see overnight someone was checking in on Oasis Helling Trust wells in Alkali Creek. I have just updated them; no real news. All appear to have gone from "loc" status to "drl" status. The Helling Trust wells will include middle Bakken, TF1, TF2, and TF3, wells, I believe. One can find the Helling Trust wells by using the "search app" on the blog (on Firefox, the "search app" is in the upper left hand corner of the blog).

This is what the Alkali Creek looks like "today" -- where the Helling Trust wells are located:

In the portion of section 22 that can be seen, there is a:

• 4-well pad with a rig on site;
• another 4-well pad with a rig on site;
• a 2-well pad, both wells producing;
• a toe of a long lateral coming from the north, producing;
• another 4-well pad with a rig on site; and,
• another 3-well pad with a rig on site, one well on DRL status, and one well on CONF status.

And, of course, just to the south of that, in the far northeast corner of section 27, two 3-well pads; and, in the far northwest corner of section 26, two 5-well pads (one pad, all five wells are producing; on the other pad, a rig is on site).

Comment: from the beginning I have been telling folks that if they "have" one well in the Bakken, they will likely have 4 wells, might have 8 wells, and could possibly have 12 wells. I really underestimated the numbers. Although we don't yet know which way all the horizontals will be going (north or south) there are 18 wells in section 22 that can be observed in that one screenshot, and we are a long way from drilling out all the formations at 330' or 660' spacing. But in just this one location, which is no longer particularly atypical for the Bakken, some mineral rights owners may be soon receiving royalties from as many as 18 wells.

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Chrylser Doing Well; Ford Not So Much (the European exposure)

Chrysler sales up almost 20% in the month of September; a surprise for analysts. Nissan, also, showed almost a 20% increase in US sales. Surprisingly, Ford sales dropped almost 3% but this is probably due to its European exposure. I get a a skewed view of Ford because I spend much of my time in Ford country -- Texas.

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ObamaEconomy

I don't know if folks have noticed, but the housing market is not doing all that well despite reports of the Obama recovery -- a term used very loosely. Periodically, housing market data is good and we get the bullish headlines but in the big scheme of things, I haven't really had a "warm fuzzy" that the housing market has been doing all that well this past year. Everyone has her own opinion.  But my perception is that the housing market is not all that hunky dory.

Now, we get reports that the construction industry in general is not doing well at all. Reuters is reporting:

U.S. construction spending unexpectedly fell in August, hit by weaker private spending outside the housing sector and a pullback in public investments.

Construction spending dropped 0.8 percent to an annual rate of $960.96 billion, the Commerce Department said on Wednesday in a report that also revised downward spending estimates for the prior two months.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast construction spending increasing 0.5 percent in August. [So, that's a swing of 1.3% with regard to expectations; actual. And worse, the expectations were for an increase; instead we get a decrease.]

The surprise decline was largely due to a 1.4 percent drop in money spent on private nonresidential construction, although outlays fell across the board with state and local construction down 0.9 percent. The declines, however, came after a month in which spending in most construction categories had posted strong gains.

But like the jobs report, look at the spin Reuters puts on the story: "The declines, however, came after a month in which spending in most construction categories had posted strong gains."

This is not exactly comforting news for folks looking for a "recovery" of some sorts. A good month, followed by a couple of bad months, and the numbers for the "good month," revised downward.

Reuters suggests most of the decline was due to nonresidential construction but something tells me it's all relative. 

It's possible the decrease in construction spending was due to the fact that contractors simply can't get their building materials to where they are needed due to the backlog in rail shipments caused by BNSF due to the Bakken oil boom due to bad decisions made by George W. Bush eight years ago.