Idle Rambling On A Sunday Night -- September 9, 2018

As much as I dislike the NFL, I may have just seen one of the most exciting compelling football games of all time. The game is not over, but ... there are stars ... and then there are super-stars ...

وَداعاً: I've never seen so many positive comments regarding President Trump in any mainstream newspaper article.

Director's Cut: tentatively scheduled for release Friday afternoon. Eighteen days ago Zacks noted that North Dakota oil production slipped in June "after hitting the highest level on record in the previous month."

The slight blip in production notwithstanding, the newest numbers showed that daily crude output remained above one million barrels for the 17th month, confirming the status of North Dakota (centered on the Bakken Shale formation) as one of the hottest shale plays in the United States. In another compelling evidence of the resurgence, North Dakota’s total number of producing wells tallied 14,778 at the end of June, the highest on record.

Comment: tea leaves suggest North Dakota will set another production record before the year is out.

I need to get going tonight.

The Immigrant Song, Karen O, Trent Rznor & Atticus Ross
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Apple: I assume everyone saw this story over at CNN -- Apple's iPhone -- $165 billion in sales this fiscal year. Bigger than Amazon's online retail stores -- $125 billion in sales this year. I still think the September 12, 2018, rollout could be Apple's biggest rollout since the original iPhone rollout. The rumors are amazing. Critics say Apple already has too many iPhone models. So, what does it look like Apple will do? Double down with three new iPhones. I'm still looking for Apple to introduce multiple phones with the same phone number: business women would use the large iPhone for work, but then take a small-screen iPhone out to weekend evening social events. Think of Apple iPhones as fashion accessories. Same for men: a large phone while working, but a small one when out with the kids.The technology is there; I'm surprised we haven't seen it yet. Having said that, look for a lot more colors for the new iPhone(s): blue, orange, red, grey, and white. Making a fashion statement?

WTI: there were some stories over the weekend lamenting the price of WTI. Apparently some traders concerned that global demand won't hit the 100-million-bbl/day target. WTI dropped from $70 to $66 fairly quickly and there were concerns that WTI was in free-fall. Maybe, but tonight light crude is up 0.52%, trading at $68.10. At $45, oil companies will survive; at $65, they thrive.

Spare capacity: I've talked about this often. From oilprice:

Saudi Arabia is the largest OPEC producer and the OPEC member with the largest spare capacity. There is one problem with this, however: some observers have questioned the size of this capacity. According to S&P Global Platts, the Saudis have 1.7 million bpd of spare production capacity, an estimate based on Platts’ July survey, but some analysts doubt that Saudi Arabia’s spare capacity is that high. Comment: there's a long

Never gets old:

Everything is Broken, Bob Dylan
Goodnight Moon-ves:

Goodnight Moon, Shivaree
Yum? Apparently it was oversold. In futures trading, it's trending higher. I just noticed it; I don't follow it.

Back to black? Someone is reading the blog: four days ago, Thursday, I wrote:

EV sales for August, link here. Tesla doing surprisingly well, blowing away the competition, delivering 22,000 EVs in August -- nearest competitor, maybe around 2,500 EVs. 

Now I see Motley Fool has this story: Tesla vehicle production and deliveries are soaring. That's not Elon Musk saying that. That's Motley Fool saying that. From the article:

In the company's second-quarter shareholder letter, Tesla forecast to produce 50,000 to 55,000 Model 3 units during Q3, with total deliveries of the vehicle coming in even higher. Tesla also importantly predicted it would report a profit in both its third and fourth quarters.

Back to Black, Amy Winehouse
I had not paid much attention to Amy Winehouse's Back to Black, but it certainly sounds like it could be a James Bond movie theme. Having said that, the opening reminds me of the old Perry Mason television theme song for some reason. They are not even close, but that's the first thing I thought of when listening to the opening bars of Back to Black.