Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Zacks' Recap Of Week's Most Important Stories -- August 31, 2016

Zacks recap of the week's most important stories:
  • the world's largest publicly traded oil company, Exxon Mobil, has decided against investing further in the proposed Alaska LNG facility
  • Royal Dutch Shell will sell all US-based properties in the Gulf of Mexico
  • Chevron entered a deal with a Chinese distributor for shipping LNG from the company's existing projects in Australia
  • Petrobras received government permission to sell 49% stake in its natural-gas distribution unit to Japan's Mitsui & Co
  • Chinese energy giant PetroChina reported huge decline in earnings and revenue
  • Not mentioned by Zacks, but it was also announced this past week that Chinese oil production may be facing "peak oil" production
******************************
Norway

I thought Norway was doing well. Maybe not. From CNN Money:
Norway's offshore oil, gas and shipping activity shrank by 1.4% in the quarter, while mainland GDP grew just 0.4%.
The government has been forced, for the first time, to tap the nation's huge sovereign wealth fund. Norway's central bank said the country might be forced to withdraw more than $9 billion from the $888 billion pension fund in 2016 to make up for the collapse in oil revenue.
***********************************
Job Watch

AP: 
  • added "a solid" 177,000 jobs in August
  • "hiring remains healthy" after two months of strong gains 
  • gains in service jobs, retailers
  • cuts in construction, manufacturing
Remember, these were the "magic numbers" BEFORE the Obama administration (link here):
First time claims, unemployment benefits: 400,000 (> 400,000: economic stagnation)
New jobs: 200,000 (< 200,000 new jobs: economic stagnation)

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.