Saudi Arabia's Foreign Exchange Reserves Plummet -- Something's Happening And The Mainstream Media Is Not Reporting It -- April 6, 2018

I don't know enough about the "Trump tariffs" to talk about it except in a very, very general way. My hunch is that the mainstream media does not know enough about "Trump tariffs" either. Producers, analysts, others have been so preoccupied with Hillary, Mueller, Russian collusion, that I truly think folks are missing some tectonic changes that are literally occurring under our feet. There are some huge stories, I think, that are not being reported.

Example: look at this chart, posted March 28, 2018, just a week or so ago. As mentioned then, it looked like Saudi Arabia might have turned the corner based on the October, November, December (2017) data, but then in January, 2018, reserves dropped, albeit slightly.
Readers know that I don't particularly care to quote/link Oilprice.com but Irina Slav has a great article today that relates directly the graph above (and one that will be posted momentarily). Ms Slav is not reporting anything readers of the blog don't already know but not many are writing about this issue in the mainstream media. I haven't subscribed to Forbes in a long, long time, but I would expect if any mainstream media would write about this story, it would be Forbes.

So, quick, what do you think Saudi's cash reserves were in February compared to January (2018)? Same, less, more? February was three days shorter than January but the price of oil stayed steady and one would expect Saudi's cash reserves to have stayed about the same month-over-month. Now that you have had time to guess, let's post the February, 2018, data.

Oh, oh.

I'm too tired to blog any more tonight, but this story, Irina Slav's story, and "Trump's tariffs" all deserve more coverage. I'll come back to these stories over the weekend.

But right now, the decline in Saudi's cash reserves in February (2018) might be the biggest story of the month. There is nothing to suggest this is a one-off. Cash reserves depend on a) revenue; and, b) expenses.

We'll close with this screenshot for now:

Huge Shout-Out To All The Readers -- April 6, 2018

Updates

April 7, 2018, 10:42 p.m. Central Time -- pageviews -- 10,999,902 -- only 98 views from eleven million pageviews, but I'm tired, ready to go to bed. Not sure what to do. On the weekend during the day, maybe 100 pageviews/hour but the number will drop significantly as we get to midnight/early morning hours in the US. I may be asleep when we go over the 11MM mark.

Original Post 

Due to family commitments, I might miss it tomorrow. But sometime this weekend, the number of pageviews for the blog should hit the 11,000,000 (11 million) mark.

Right now, 8:30 p.m. Central Time, April 6, 2018, pageviews are at: 10,996,854.

During the week, the blog averages about 3,500 pageviews/day (24 hours).


Right now, there are only 3,146 pageviews until we hit eleven million. I don't know what the average pageviews are on the weekend but I assume it's significantly less than the weekday average.

During the boom, readership averaged around 6,000 pageviews/day. Early on, there were days that exceeded 7,000 pageviews. I did note 7,313 pageviews on April 11, 2012.

As the Bakken has matured, the number of pageviews has decreased. The record low that I noted was 2,894 on August 14, 2016.

One can track pageviews at the bottom of the blog, below the "tags," on the lower left side of the blog.

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Memories

Massachussetts, The Bee Gees

**************************

The Beatles vs The Bee Gees

Over the years I've wracked my brain trying to sort out, on a rational basis, which group was better, the Beatles or the Bee Gees.

Earlier this week, I finally "solved" the problem. There is no answer. The two groups are in different "arenas." Whatever arena you want to put the Beatles in, and whatever arena you want to put the Bee Gees in, they are each the best in their arena. But they are in different arenas. Apples and oranges.

But if you ask me, right now, at this moment, to whom do I prefer to listen? The Bee Gees, hands down.

Eleven New Permits; Three DUCs Completed; Three Permits Renewed; WTI Falls -- April 6, 2018

Active rigs:

$62.06↓↓	4/6/2018	04/06/2017	04/06/2016	04/06/2015	04/06/2014
Active Rigs	58	49	28	94	192

Eleven (11) new permits:

• Operators: MRO (7); Whiting (4)
• Fields: Killdeer (Dunn); Tyrone (Williams)
• Comments: Whiting has permits for a 4-well Berger pad in SESW 10-156-101; MRO has permits for a 4-well pad in SESE 23-146-95; MRO also has permits for a 3-well pad in SWSW 36-146-95;

Three permits renewed:

• EOG (2): two Liberty LR permits in Mountrail County
• BR: one Saddle Butte permit in McKenzie County

Three producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:

• 23967, 2,367, WPX, Arikara 15-22HD, Reunion Bay, t3/18; cum --
• 23966, 2,086, WPX, Arikara 15-22HY, Reunion Bay, t3/18; cum --
• 23963, 2,017, WPX, Arikara 15-22HX, Reunion Bay, t3/18; cum --

Off The Net For Awhile

God's country.

The Political Page, T+38 -- April 6, 2018

The best part of my day, politically, is the daily "periscope / podcast" by Scott Adams. I'm not sure if he goes live at the exact same time every day, but he apparently begins his "periscope" about 10:00 a.m. Central Time, reporting out of California, 8:00 a.m. their time.

The "periscope" shows up later on Twitter.

The live "periscope" shows real-time comments from those listening to Scott Adams. He's really quite remarkable. To some extent, one might think of Scott Adams as "Rush Lite." Rush does not make predictions, for the most part, but he is perhaps the best political analyst at the presidential level. Rush seldom goes farther down than presidential politics, and he generally sticks to politics.

Scott Adams, on the other hand, is interested in "human persuasion" and likes to test his theories by making predictions. He covers the trending topics of the day, not necessarily "pure politics" but in this environment, "everything is politics."

If I had to choose one or the other for my daily dose of "political commentary," right now it would be Scott Adams.

It's a little bit hard to find Scott Adams when he goes live every weekday morning (I don't know if he does a commentary on the weekends). I go to twitter; search "Scott Adams" on twitter; select his home page (not "Dilbert"); and, then wait for the "periscope" to pop up. It's easy to miss. Then I click on the "periscope camcast" which takes me to the live "periscope" which has real-time comments streaming at the sidebar at the right.

And, as noted, if you miss it, it will be shown on twitter a few minutes later where it stays "forever" for playback.

I've also caught a Scott Adams "periscope" later in the day; whether that's a regular feature or not, I don't yet know.

Today: I'll be watching the Masters. Perhaps my least favorite golfer on the PGA circuit is Sergio Garcia. I was lucky enough to catch this live. It was incredible to watch this as it was happening. Sergio sets a record:



The amazing thing: Sergio might have been leading after the 1st round had it not been for the 15th hole.

Another PGA Masters Augusta note: midway through the second day of the four-day tournament, only two players have failed to log a birdie on any 5-par hole: one is an amateur player; the other is .... drum roll .... Tiger Woods. 

Let's end on a positive note:

What Is Love, Haddaway

*********************************

The China Page

Deng Xiaoping And The Transformation of China
Ezra  Vogel
c. 2011 
951.05 VOG 

The British lease on Hong Kong would expire in 1997. Deng Xiaoping to British governor of Hong Kong, 1979: "If you think governing Hong Kong is hard, you ought to try governing China."

1979: China was in a disastrous state

• 30 million people died during the previous decade, the Great Leap Forward
• average per capita income of Chinese peasants, who made up 80 percent of the population, was $40 (US)
• the amount of grain produced per person had fallen below what it had been in 1957

Deng Xiaoping

• b. 1904
• comes to power as "preeminent leader of China": 1978
• steps aside: 1992

Chapter 1: From Revolutionary to Builder to Reformer, 1904 - 1969
Chapter 2: Banishment and Return, 1969 - 1974
Chapter 3: Bringing Order under Mao, 1974 - 1975
Chapter 4: Looking Forward Under Mao, 1975
Chapter 5: Sidelined as the Mao Era Ends, 1976
Chapter 6: Return under Hua, 1977 - 1978
Chapter 7: Three Turning Points, 1978
Chapter 8: Setting the Limits of Freedom, 1978 - 1979
Chapter 9: The Soviet-Vietnamese Threat, 1978 - 1979
Chapter 10: Opening to Japan, 1978
Chapter 11: Opening to the United States, 1978 - 1979
Chapter 12: Launching the Deng Administration, 1979- 1980
Chapter 13: Deng's Art of Governing
Chapter 14: Experiments in Guangdong and Fujian, 1979 - 1984
Chapter 15: Economic Readjustment and Rural Reform, 1978 - 1982
Chapter 16: Accelerating Economic Growth and Opening, 1982 - 1989
Chapter 17: One Country, Two Systems: Taiwan, hong Kong, and Tibet
Chapter 18: The Military: Preparing for Modernization
Chapter 19: The Ebb and Flow of Politics
Chapter 20: Beijing Spring, April 15 - May 17, 1989
Chapter 21: The Tiananmen Tragedy, May 17 - June 4, 1989
Chapter 22: Standing Firm, 1989 - 1992
Chapter 23: Deng's Finale: The Southern Journey, 1992
Chapter 24: China Transformed

Conoco; The Permian -- April 6, 2018

Link here. [As I was reading this, the one play I never hear anything about any more -- the Monterey, California.]

More and more reading of the Permian suggests that, of the majors, Conoco has the inside edge in the Permian. If not, it's becoming a trope in the business world. COP bought into the Permian decades ago; holds "all" its Permian assets by production; no longer any need to rush into the Permian and acquisition costs so low that $60 oil is very, very profitable for COP in the Permian. I have no idea if that's a correct reading, but that's what I'm "seeing."

From the linked article:

• COP actually selling non-core assets in the Permian; relatively small, underdeveloped patches of land
• just announced it is selling non-core assets in the Permian and South Texas for $250 million
• same announcement: acquiring acreage in the Montney conventional play in Canada and the Austin Chalk in Louisiana (both the Montney and the Austin Chalk tracked at the sidebar at the right) (May 20, 2017: as a natural gas play, Montney, "Permian of the North" is back)
• strategy: buying low; selling high
• COP's priority: streamline its portfolio as much as possible; focus on low-cost, potentially high-return assets and offloading the rest
• past twelve months: COP shares have gained almost 30% as opposed to an almost 10% slide for XOM
• Conoco's sustaining cost per bbl: $40
• at the start of February (2018), Conoco announced it would life the 2018 dividend by 7.5%; buy back shares worth $2 billion despite booking a loss of 2017
• 2017: paid down $7.6 billion in debt; bought back $3 billion shares
• 2017: reported a 200% organic reserve base replacement rate

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment, financial, job, travel, or relationship decisions based on anything your read here or think you may have read here. 

********************************

The Mystery Page

The Mystery of Lewis Carroll: Discovering the Whimsical, Thoughtful, and Sometimes Lonely Man Who Created Alice In Wonderland, Jenny Woolf, c. 2010.

A quick look at the earlier part of the book suggests Leis Carroll was a very private man. That's not particularly profound, or unusual, or interesting. A lot of "famous" people are very private.

So, on to Chapter 10: "He offered large discount, he offered a cheque"/Money

• Carroll's bank account recently discovered, "...discovered after a hundred years unseen in an archive in northern England..."; presumed to have been a wealthy man; his bank account suggests otherwise 
• Oxford Old Bank
• opened his account, 1856; Lewis Carroll was 24 years old
• account closed, two years after his death, 1900
• only value of the account now: it is the only major document about Lewis Carroll that is both factual and completely unaltered
• Carroll made a relatively modest amount of money from his books, and by no means a fortune
• never in a single year did he earn anything approaching the annual income of Alice's father, Dean Liddell, at the time Alice in Wonderland was written
• at the time, he thought he might actually lose money on the book
• made little money from marketing or stage productions 
• he pretty much spent all the money he had publishing this book
• few checking transactions in the early years; checks were fairly "new'; most folks used cash
• apparently there is a period in his diary that is blank; the "mystery years"
• November, 1861, a payment of £94; amounted to a quarter of Carroll's annual income at the time -- a quarter of his annual income: to someone called "Forster"
• the payment was made during the missing diary period; adds to the several other mysteries which shroud those blank (diary) years
• just weeks before Carroll, with considerable reluctance, took Holy Orders
• apparently Forster lived in the Oxford area, but no "Forster" appears elsewhere in the account
• author unable to identify any tradesman or tradeswoman by that name in Oxford at that time
• no surviving documentation links Carroll with Forster, except for a letter written on January 13, 1872, over ten (10) years later, to John Foster (1812 - 76) the biographer, historian and friend of Charles Dickens
• the tone of the letter suggests that the two men had previously met and were on cordial but distant terms
• they had a mutual contact: Carroll's favorite uncle Skeffington Lutwidge
• however, that John Forster did not live in Oxford; does not seem to be him
• the author has no more insight; simply suggesting that Carroll had a private life about which we know nothing
• very charitable; gave money to friends when in need; and gave money to charitable foundations (like churches; pets) even when he, himself, had little money
• the chapter relatively uninteresting but very important for the biography

A quick and superficial perusal of the biography suggests Lewis Carroll was not a particularly interesting individual, and someone with whom I would really not want to spend any time.

The Daily Note

Well, these 69 days have been a bust -- the sixty-nine days following Trump's announcement of a trade war. Most of the world was exempt (EU, including Great Britain; Mexico; Canada; others; some mild restrictions on China that few can list; tariffs were supposed to go in after 90 days; apparently that 90-day notice has been extended. So, we close out this chapter and move on to the next chapter. 

May 8, 2018, T+69: wow, seriously?

May 7, 2018, T+68:

May 6, 2018, T+67: Scott Adams "loses it" on "live" periscope -- furious with others telling him who he can speak with. Fallout from Kanye West story.

May 5, 2018, T+66: Warren Buffett's annual love fest. Hard to believe but Charlie Munger is 94 years old.

May 4, 2018, T+65: Kerry exposed. Oh, that's right. The president's one night with Stormy.

May 3, 2018, T+64: TSLA plunges 5% after a most bizarre conference call in which Elon Musk essentially told analyst to f*** themselves.

May 2, 2018, T+63: Mueller wants to charge Trump for thinking "bad thoughts."

May 1, 2018, T+62: Trump extends exemptions on steel, aluminum tariffs. Not a bit unexpected. The tea leaves suggested he would do this.

April 30, 2018, T+61: Highlight of the day -- the art museum in Chicago.

April 29, 2018, T+60: Older daughter graduated with advanced degree from Rush University.

April 28, 2018, T+59: I was in Chicago for the weekend.

April 27, 2018, T+58: 1Q18 GDP, first reading, 2.3%. Mainstream media not impressed.

April 26, 2018, T+57: first time unemployment claims near a 50-year low; US trade deficit narrows for the first time in 7 months. Making America great again.

April 25, 2018, T+56: Scott Adams had great interview with Joel Pollak on Iran. Again, shows how "small" Chris "worried about spelling" Cuomo looks compared to a cartoonist. 

April 24, 2018, T+55: one of the reasons I enjoy reading so much, it puts current events into perspective. When reading The Opium Wars, W Travis Hanes III, c. 2002, I am reminded how incredibly small Chris Cuomo is and why Trump is a billionaire and president and Chris is not. While Chris Cuomo is focused on typing errors (which may not be "errors" in the first place), Trump is negotiating a denuclearized Korean peninsula. Stock market tanks, led by FANG. "Caravan" of Honduran immigrants at Southern Border. Great photo op. 

April 23, 2018, T+54: OMG. The Democrats are now tweeting displeasure that President Trump makes spelling errors. LOL. You have got to be kidding. 

April 22, 2018, T+53: mainstream (alt-left) media absolutely fascinated with Mar-A-Lago, the "Southern White House," and his golfing. The difference between Obama & golfing; and, Trump & golfing is this: it is in character for Trump and he's getting things done; golfing was out of character for Obama, and he didn't get anything done. Cognitive dissonance explains a lot of Trump Derangement Syndrome. 

April 21, 2018, T+52: quiet. 

April 20, 2018, T+51: North Korea announces that it will freeze all nuclear missile testing. Wow, wow, wow. And Trump will get no credit. One month ago, the North Korean nuclear story was the #1 security concern for the US. Now that Trump solved this problem, the alt-left response? Ho-hum. It gets tedious.

April 19, 2018, T+50: Trump says oil prices too high. [He's correct."

April 18, 2018, T+49: oil "surging" in price; approaching $69. Might hit $70. Saudi "hawk" wants to see $100 oil. Saudi needs $100+ oil to get Aramco valuation of $2 trillion for successful IPO.

April 17, 2018, T+48: market is off to another great start -- earnings season appears that it won't disappoint. On another note, I really thought Kudlow was smarter than this -- US ambassador to UN Haley is a rising star in the GOP. For an "old white male" to call her "momentarily confused" was an enormous mistake on the part of Kudlow. He is quickly wearing out his welcome, and he has not even been sworn in yet.

April 16, 2018, T+47: huge day for the market; led by Netflix.

April 15, 2018, T+46: quiet, so far.

April 14, 2018, T+45: Rachel Maddow, et al, appear not to have much of a problem with using chemical weapons on women and children. 

April 13, 2018, T+44: quiet. Until late in the evening. US, France, Great Britain launch missiles against Syria. Early reports suggest the missiles hit their targets. If so (we'll know later), then it means that Putin's' missile defense system was ineffective against US, French, and British missiles.

April 12, 2018, T+43: it looks like Trump is not a lot different than Obama when it comes to Syria. Another line in the (blowing) sand.

April 11, 2018, T+42: quiet. Trump giving the Russians time to clear out of Dodge (Syria) and get their a/c out of harm's way.

April 10, 2018, T+41: quiet. All day. Until this.

President Donald Trump’s homeland security adviser was abruptly forced out of his job Tuesday after months of internal frustration with his leadership and as the new national security adviser moved to establish power in the White House, according to people familiar with the matter.

The departure of Tom Bossert, who has advised Mr. Trump on cybersecurity and counterterrorism since the beginning of his administration, marked the latest exit from the Trump administration as the president reshapes his leadership team.

The surprise move was instigated by John Bolton, the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and ex-Fox News commentator who officially started this week as Mr. Trump’s new national security adviser, the people said.

April 9, 2018, T+40: quiet. Until later afternoon. Then all hell broke loose. Market drops 400 points in five minutes. News that the FBI had raided Trump's personal lawyer.

April 8, 2018, T+39: Patrick Reed wins his first major, Masters at Augusta.

April 7, 2018, T+38: think about this -- who is the bigger customer -- by about 100x? The US or China. How much "stuff" does China really import from the US? Not much -- especially if you agree that the trade imbalance is huge -- and it's in China's favor. Pretty funny.  America's big trading partners: Canada. Mexico. England. Europe. Japan. South America. Have we gotten to China yet? 

April 6, 2018, T+37: Cognitive dissonance: the alt-left is now defending China's on-going practice of intellectual theft. The alt-left is now defending China's unfair trade practices. 

April 5, 2018, T+36: China - US. Trump doubles down. 

April 4, 2018, T+35: China imports manufacturing, technology, energy, and intellectual property from the US; the US imports stuffed Christmas toys from China.

April 3, 2018, T+34: GM ends its monthly reporting of sales. This tells me GM sees bad news down the road. Scott Adams argues that it is now a done-deal that the southern wall will be built. President Trump says he will have the military protect the southern border from the "caravan." The military cannot afford to place a standing army along the border. The only cost-effective method is a wall. So, we'll see. Ah, yes, the trade war begins: the US considers tariffs on 1,300 Chinese products. The link is to a CNN news site, so you know it's fake news.

April 2, 2018, T+33: Chinese - US trade war starting to ramp up. Agricultural products? California? Pork? Iowa? Both states overwhelmingly anti-Trump. Probably just coincidental. Tesla shares plummet.

April 1, 2018, T+32: Elon Musk (Tesla) jokes on twitter. Trump says DACA is dead (see yesterday's note). China places 25% tariff on 128 US products.

March 31, 2018, T+31: "a thousand" Hondurans walking through Mexico to cross the US border.

******************************

Fight's On: Let The Trade Wars Begin

Days 31 -- 69 -- this page
Days 1 - 31

The 38 Days Following The Schumer Shut-Down

Days 1 -- 38

The 2 Days of The Schumer Shut Down

Days 1 -  2

The Last 65 Days of His First Term

Days 331 - 365
Days 301 - 330

The Trump Presidency (201 - 300)
The Third 100 Days

The Third 30 Days + 10 (261 - 300)
The Second 30 Days (Days 231 - 260)
The First 30 Days (Days 201 - 230)

The Trump Presidency (101 - 200)
The Second 100 Days
 The Third 30 Days + 10 (161 - 200)
The Second 30 Days (Days 131 - 160)
 The First 30 Days (Days 101 - 130)

The Trump Presidency (1 - 100)
The First 100 Days
The Third 30 days + 10

The Second 30 Days 
The First 30 Days

Between Election And Inauguration (1 - 100)
The Third 10 Days

The Second 30 Days

The First 30 Days

It Could Be Worse -- Only In The Dakotas -- Why I Love To Blog -- April 6, 2018

A huge thanks to Don alerting me to the current weather conditions in the Bakken.

Disclaimer: I often mis-read charts. If this information is important to you, go to the source.

Link here.

Link here.

Link here.

Unless I'm missing something or mis-reading something, Williston set a new all-time low temperature record this morning, hitting -3 degrees Fahrenheit.

Unless I'm missing something, Williston has never recorded a temperature below 0 degrees on any previous April 6. The previous cold temperature record goes back to 1936 when it still did not go below 0 degrees.

By the way, my dad grew up in Newell, SD, and he still talks about the winter of 1936. He was about 14 years old at the time and remembers riding with his dad on an open horse-drawn cart delivering milk from their cows they had milked earlier that morning.

He remembers his dad (my grandfather) telling him, "it could be worse."  I guess my grandfather was correct. It could be worse. It could be "below zero."

Just to confirm:

Dueling Banjoes Comes To Mind -- April 6, 2018 -- Staggering

 Updates

April 6, 2018: see first comment --

About 450 rigs currently drilling.

Enno's site had about 3,000 new wells in 2017, let's say 9 per day.
Peg each new well at 1,000 barrels/day to start, giving 9,000 bpd increase.
90 days of that - with no drop off in output - is over 800,000 barrels of oil.

That is a lot of oil. 

My thoughts: Think of that. Compare 450 rigs drilling in the Permian vs 60 rigs drilling in the Bakken. 

Later, 10:03 p.m. Central Time: the original note began with links regarding the Permian and then morphed into comparing the Bakken boom (2007 - 2014) with the current Permian boom (2014 -- the present day).

Having said that and having focused on that, one can easily forget the much bigger story: the absolutely incredible story with regard to US shale. It is truly amazing.

Look at this screenshot taken from this site:

Do you see what I see? If I'm reading the chart correctly, the Permian hit 1.9 million bopd just before the end of the year (2017) and then dropped back a bit (North Dakota Bakken -- supposedly a much smaller play, was producing about 1 million bopd in the same time frame). But I digress. Back to the point. If I'm reading the chart correctly, the Permian hit 1.9 million bopd just before the end of the year (2017) and then dropped back a bit.

1.9 million bbls (slightly less) at the end of 2017. Hold that thought.

It was reported earlier this week (and posted on the blog) that the EIA estimates that the Permian set a new production record with 3.1 million bopd. If that's accurate, that is staggering. A jump from 1.9 million bopd to 3.1 million bopd over any time period is staggering (remember Hubbert's peak oil theory) but in this case, the Permian may have gone from 1.9 million bopd to 3.1 million bopd in less than three months. Absolutely staggering.

If that comes true -- a jump to 3.1 million bopd from 1.9 million bopd  -- what's the delta? Exactly "another Bakken." The delta is 1.2 million bopd -- North Dakota (mostly the Bakken) is producing about 1.2 million bopd. Staggering.

Original Post

Crash? There's a very, very short summary of the Permian over at SeekingAlpha today but it articulates at least to some extent what I've been noticing for the past year. A reader comments on a SeekingAlpha article regarding the Permian:

• operations in the Permian Basin are like being on a tread mill; once drilling activity slows production will drop like a rock
• current production growth is limited due to the lack of transportation or the ability to flair NG from existing wells
• service costs are escalating at double-digit rates with the acreage cost in the prime areas running as high a $60,000 or more per net mineral acre it makes more sense to sell your acreage than to drill it. I've sold some in excess of $80,000 per net mineral which is just nuts 
• current pumping technology is not able to pump the oil from laterals that are running over 10,000 feet without constant breakdowns resulting in higher operating costs
• well communication has been a known problem is the Basin for a long time and is only getting a lot worse. It's a known fact that you can take a 30-year-old Spraberry well that is producing 1-2 Bbls per week and shut it in for an extended period of time and the well will recharge itself over time. It's one of the more permeable basins in the country [this one I'm not concerned about]

Those were the very same concerns we heard during the Bakken boom and the Bakken did just fine. The difference for me:

• Permian acreage trading for as much as $80,000 / acre
• during the early Bakken boom, WTI was selling for well over $100/bbl 

But this is the problem: because the Permian is getting so much more coverage than the Bakken ever did (except for the negative stories on fracking and pipelines), once we start hearing about operators failing in the Permian, it will have a snowball effect. It's easy to forget that not all operators survived in the Bakken either.

Operators that bought in late (XOM?) could be in trouble; operators that bought decades ago (COP) might do very, very well.

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment, financial, job, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or what you think you might have read here.

The link also includes a nice graphic for those interested in the Concho - RMS Permian deal.

The comment posted above were in reply to a "Blue Quadrant Capital Management" article. In response to another comments, "Blue Quadrant" replied:

If you go to this site, you will see that wells completed in 2010 in the Bakken are still flowing .. in fact production from these wells is still at 20% of the initial production rate ...

The long production tail post the first few years of decline is actually quite a positive dynamic for shale companies It doesnt seem to be the same in the Permian though , as we can see wells that were completed in 2012 , although they are still flowing now, the production from these wells are only around 10% of the initial production rate ... whether this will change or not, or if it is due to more intensive early fracs in the Permian as opposed to the Bakken , or an entirely different geology, cannot say ...

This link (the same as above) has a very, very nice interactive chart regarding the Bakken. 

No, I'm not going to post Dueling Banjoes. I never cared for that song. Instead:

Dreamin', Johnny Burnette

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs -- Not! -- April 6, 2018

Jobs: anticipating 178,000 new non-farm jobs; unemployment rate down to 4.0%. Nope: unable to tick down. Still at 4.1%. "March jobs disappoint."

The March jobs report is out and it’s a miss.

In March, the economy added 103,000 jobs while the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1% for the fifth-straight month, according to the latest report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Economists had expected the report to show 185,000 jobs were created in March while the unemployment rate was expected to fall to 4%, according to estimates from Bloomberg. March’s report is also a big slowdown from the 313,000 jobs created in February.

Fascination: apparently I'm not the only "oil blog" fascinated with the Tesla story. A screenshot of the "front page" over at oilprice.com today:

Story here:

• Fox Business News analyst suggest share price could "crash" within next six months with capital raise
• even if Tesla were to finally hit a Model X production target, Tesla would continue to face financial challenges. Tesla, [the analyst] argues, is still losing $2 billion per year and $20,000 per vehicle on its $100,000 vehicle. The Model 3, which will sell for about half that, is unlikely to be a bearer of significant profits for the EV manufacturer.

 Best way to track traders' confidence in Tesla: follow the 2025 non-callable bonds.

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Back to the Bakken

Active rigs:

$62.93↓↓	4/6/2018	04/06/2017	04/06/2016	04/06/2015	04/06/2014
Active Rigs	57	49	28	94	192

RBN Energy: oil-weighted exploration and production companies are flush at $60 oil.

Despite widespread predictions that the oil and gas exploration and production sector would drown in an ocean of red ink after the crude oil price crash that started a little over three years ago, E&P companies finally returned to profitability in 2017. Better yet, with oil prices exceeding $60/bbl, margins are expected to increase in 2018, giving the 44 major E&Ps we track $24.5 billion in incremental cash flow. It’s no surprise that the 17 companies in our Oil-Weighted Peer Group are the prime beneficiaries of the higher crude price, garnering $13.6 billion, or 55%, of the incremental cash flow. Today, we continue our review of how rebounding oil prices are affecting E&P cash flow, this time zeroing in on oil-focused producers.

The severe plunge in oil prices in late 2014 and 2015 at first appeared to be a crippling blow to U.S. E&Ps addicted to wild spending fueled by $100/bbl oil prices. But most of the upstream industry weathered the crisis remarkably well through new strategies. 

These included the “high-grading” of portfolios, impressive capital discipline and an intense focus on operational efficiencies. After slashing capital expenditures by 70% — from $46 billion in 2014 to $15 billion in 2016 — and reducing drilling and operating expenses by an average 50%, the oil-weighted producers we track emerged financially stable.

Growth resumed in 2017, as our universe of E&Ps boosted capex by 43% to $56 billion, a level still less than half of 2014 spending. The focus of that spending shifted to premium unconventional plays, with two-thirds allocated to the Permian, Eagle Ford, SCOOP/STACK, Bakken, and Marcellus/Utica. Even at $50/bbl crude oil prices, the industry returned to profitability in the first quarter of 2017. Despite a mid-year dip in oil prices that dampened production from first-quarter 2017 levels, most E&Ps didn’t throttle back on their capital investment budgets, expecting a recovery. By year’s end, prices were up to about $60/bbl, validating their strategy, and the E&Ps we track ended 2017 narrowly in the black.