Tiger Woods withdraws after 11 holes, first round.
Job watch: robust job environment -- AP is reporting:
Steady economic growth and
consumer spending likely led U.S. employers to hire at a healthy pace in
January and extend last year's solid job gains.
Economists
have forecast that the economy gained 230,000 jobs in January,
according to a survey by FactSet. The unemployment rate is expected to
stay at a six-year low of 5.6 percent.
In fact: numbers blow away the estimates - payroll jobs added -- an astounding 257,000 jobs.
Unemployment rate ticks up to 5.7%. In post-Bush era, that's full employment.
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Emerald Oil announces the pricing of ~24.55 mln common stock offering of at $1.12/share: The company intends to use the net proceeds from this offering for working capital and for general corporate purposes.
Pandora shares fell sharply before the stock market opened Friday, a day
after the music streaming service reported disappointing fourth-quarter
results and revenue outlooks as it spent more money on marketing and
product development. I've blogged about Pandora often; I was an early adopter with Pandora but quickly lost interest. Apple Radio is now my favorite. It meshes with iTunes so I can easily switch from my iTunes library to Apple Radio. Apple Radio does everything Pandora does, as far as I know, but I haven't listened to Pandora in ages.
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Active rigs:
| 2/6/2015 | 02/06/2014 | 02/06/2013 | 02/06/2012 | 02/06/2011 |
|---|
| Active Rigs | 136 | 191 | 182 | 201 | 165 |
RBN Energy:
Natural gas forward curves.
The Dominion South Point strip price for the balance of 2015
(March-December) has been settling consistently under $1.90/MMBtu, while
Transco Zone 6 in New York is averaging around $2.80/MMBtu in this
week’s forwards market. Meanwhile, Northeast and US gas production
remain near record levels. The breakeven price environment and looming
oversupply leaves producers and the industry vulnerable to the downside.
Where and when will prices bottom out? What, if anything, would trigger
a rebound? Today Part 4 of our Forward Curve Series, focuses on
fundamental factors driving Northeast forward curves over the next few
years.
In Part 1
of this series we looked at the factors that influence natural gas
forward curve prices in the US market, the big five being: supply,
demand, storage, transportation/infrastructure and weather.
In Part 2 and Part 3,
we dove into the Northeast gas market, examined the region’s
transformation to become a net producer and reviewed the dramatic
reshaping of its forward curves. The trigger for this transformation is
local production growth from the Marcellus/Utica shales, which tipped
the Northeast supply/demand balance in less than a decade from
perpetually supply-short to largely self-sufficient and on the brink of
oversupply. In the new gas world, Northeast forward curves have shifted
from what were historically premium prices (above Henry Hub) to major
discounts ($1.00/MMBtu or more below Henry Hub). Given where Henry Hub
is trading these days ($2.00/MMBtu and $3.00/MMBtu handles through at
least 2021), that means outright prices in the Northeast are skirting
breakeven levels for producers for the next few years.
There is no
obvious reverse on this bullet train. But where are the curves headed?
This time, we look at fundamental factors at play.
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Brian Williams: High And Dry In Aftermath Of Hurricane Katrina
The New Orleans Advocate is reporting:
And last year, in an interview with Tom Brokaw, the man he replaced in the anchor chair at NBC, Williams said:
“My week, two weeks there was not helped by the
fact that I accidentally ingested some of the floodwater. I became very
sick with dysentery, our hotel was overrun with gangs, I was rescued in
the stairwell of a five-star hotel in New Orleans by a young police
officer. We are friends to this day. And uh, it just was uh, I look back
at total agony.”
But the French Quarter, the original high ground of
New Orleans, was not impacted by the floodwaters that overwhelmed the
vast majority of the city.
A spokesman for NBC did not immediately respond
Thursday to questions about those comments, the hotel to which Williams
referred, whether Williams stands by the claims or whether the network
is reviewing them.
Williams has described his experiences during
Katrina as personally transformative, and he has returned to the city
and the topic numerous times since.
“I saw fear, I saw death, I saw depravity, I saw
firearms being brandished, I saw looting,” he told the Los Angeles Times
a year after Katrina made landfall.
He also recalled the danger of the moment in a 2007 interview on C-SPAN.
“We had to have men with guns behind me one night
because I was the only source of light downtown, was the lights that
were illuminating the broadcast,” Williams said. “We were told not to
drink our bottled water in front of people because we could get killed
for it.”
Starting to sound like a blog.
