Cleaning Off The Desktop -- June 10, 2019

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 may have read here. 

I'm cleaning off the desktop.

1. Smart phones. I am blown away by the smart phones these days, everything they can do. I have an iPhone SE, 4-inch, smallest screen available. Love it.

2. Search. Interesting story on Apple's partnering with Google as its search engine.

3. Investing. Barron's: Chevron and four other oil stocks to play the Permian Basin boom. In today's (June 10, 2019) issue. I was surprised to see Chevron at the top. On "google.news" on my little iPhone I can read the entire article; on the MacBook Air, it's behind a paywall. Go figure.

4. Shale. After listening to the two presentations (YouTube) sent to me by a reader yesterday/today, I now understand the Permian better. The presentations are posted here. I now understand why horizontals in the Bakken are "long" laterals and "extended reach" laterals whereas the Permian are still "shorter" laterals. I think "mom-and-pop" investors can make this fact work for them.

5. Pipelines. Motley Fool has an article on Energy Transfer today (also, June 10, 2019). It begins:

Energy Transfer has invested billions of dollars in expanding its midstream infrastructure over the past few years. Many of these projects have recently entered service, which is fueling a big uptick in earnings. During the first quarter, for example, cash flow was up nearly 40% versus the year-ago period. That has the company on track to increase its earnings by about 13% from 2018's total.

However, one thing that Energy Transfer's management team made clear on its recent first-quarter conference call is that the company still has plenty of growth up ahead. Overall, it sees three main drivers that should fuel growth in the coming years: LNG, China, and oil pipelines.

.... an agreement with Shell that provides the foundation to further develop the Lake Charles LNG export facility toward a potential final investment decision or FID ...  put Energy Transfer and Shell on track to approve construction early next year, which could enable them to have it in service and generating cash flow by late 2024 to early 2025.

6.  Eraserhead. I've never seen this movie; I desperately want to see it but I won't buy or rent the DVD and I  haven't looked for any internet streaming options. I desperately want to see it but I'm afraid I will be disappointed so I have not made an effort to find it. Now, "tonight" -- or rather early tomorrow morning, TCM will show Eraserhead. It comes on about 2:30 a.m. Not sure if it's worth getting up to watch. I'll be in bed by 11:30 p.m. -- should I get up at 2:30 a.m. to watch it. Normally, I would but I will be picking up Sophia and her mother at the DFW airport tomorrow at 9:50 a.m.  So, we'll see. [Later: no, I did not get up to watch it. Will have to wait for another opportunity.]

7. Really? Unanimous? Right, wrong, or indifferent -- whether you "like" the outcome or not, it's nice to see that, at least in some cases, the justices still "follow the law of the land." Did I mention that the ruling was unanimous? From the AP:

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday against workers on oil drilling platforms off California who argued they should be paid for the off-work time they spend on the platform, including sleeping.

The high court said that federal law applies to the workers and doesn't require them to be paid for nonworking time spent at their work location on the Outer Continental Shelf. The workers had argued that California law, which would require them to be compensated for that time, should apply. 

8. Alexa. I honestly don't understand the controversy. I love the Echo and Alexa. It's incredible. If you don't like Alexa listening in on you:

• don't buy the Echo in the first place;
• if you do have it, turn it off when you're not using it;
• live alone and don't talk out loud to yourself

9. Homeless in Seattle. From Bloomberg -- "Amazon led a tax rebellion. A year later, Seattle is gridlocked." Trying to blame Amazon for the homeless problem in Seattle. Give me a break.

10. Going broke: the website that is a project of the Democratic Party’s primary think tank, is facing dire financial troubles and bleeding staff, according to primary-source documents viewed by The Daily Beast. Words I love seeing in the same sentence: Democratic ... Party's ... think ... tank ... facing ... dire ... financial ... troubles. I particularly like the word dire. The name of the website: ThinkProgress.

11. Another EV battery fire. Audi. From Fortune. Or "misfortune." "... no more prone to battery fires..." then why is this a headline story? Look at the huge number of cars involved in the recall: 1,664. LOL. 1,664. Generally we see automobile recalls involving millions of vehicles. Not a thousand.

Volkswagen AG luxury brand Audi is recalling its first all-electric vehicle due to the risk of a battery fire.

The company issued a voluntary recall of approximately 540 E-Tron SUV models sold in the U.S. because of a risk that moisture can seep into the battery cell through a wiring harness glitch. The company isn’t aware of any fires or injuries because of the flaw, which affects a total of 1,644 models, he said.

The E-Tron, which went on sale in the U.S. in April, is Audi’s first fully-electric car and one in a wave of contenders from traditional automakers looking to challenge Tesla Inc.’s dominance of the segment. While electric vehicles are no more prone to accidents or fires than gasoline-powered cars — and might be less so, according the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration — the lithium-ion battery technology that powers them is still evolving, and there is no consensus on safe system design.

12. Uber Eats: $5 McDonald's meal. $15 delivery charge. Soggy French fries. [No, I did not do this; read about it on the internet some days ago; didn't get the like. Probably a fake story.]

13. Hero traitor. Two new biographies of Benedict Arnold reviewed in winter issue of Claremont Review of Books:

• Turncoat: Benedict Arnold and the Crisis of American Liberty, Stephen Brumwell, Yale University Press, 384 pages
• The Tragedy of Benedict Arnold: An American Life, Joyce Lee Malcolm, Pegasus Books, 336 pages

14.  Shale. Five screenshots from the presentations posted earlier today. The "breakeven" presentation is an "older" presentation: the breakeven has certainly not increased since then.