Notes From All Over -- Part 1, July 19, 2019

Updates

Later, 12:32 p.m. CT: something doesn't make sense to me. Two screenshots of the NASDAQ this morning. In the original link, before the opening, the NASDAQ (futures) up 20 points and said to be 7,954:



Now, later today, the NASDAQ is up a meager 7 points and said to be trading at 8,214 points, well above the earlier number, 7,954.

There is nothing new here, but I just noted this today when I was trying to figure out if the NASDAQ has ever gone above 8,000 (see original note below).

 Original Note

Great, great mood today. Lots of things going on.

Disclaimer: do not make any investment, financial, job, career, travel, or relationship decisiosn based on what you read here or what you think you might have read here.

Disclaimer: I am inappropriately exuberant about the Bakken.

Several big stories. These are at oilprice.com; will come back to them later.

• Mexico goes forward with $8 billion oil refinery against advice
• tensions mount in the Mideast; oil dropped to $55 yesterday; recovered this morning to $56
• China added more coal power in 2019 and 2020 to meet energy demand
• Trump administration announces huge Gulf of Mexico oil and gas lease sale
• China's oil consumption rises almost 6% in 1H19 -- previously reported/posted
• Ohio delivers "death blow" to renewables

Politics: Bernie's staffers said to be frustrated with low pay. Tell me it isn't true. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."

The US equity markets: I assume this is why I"m in a great mood. All three major indices trading at near record highs, and after a couple of days "in the red," are now "very green" before market open.Earnings for 2Q19 reported so far are not nearly as bad as pundits/companies warned. The banks in general, first to report, did very well, it appears. I am most interested in how natural gas gathering and processing companies do going forward.

IBM: reported a good 2Q19, apparently; saw the headline, nothing else

West Texas Light: just a reminder that it's a new benchmark; not easy to find; 

Data points:

• Dow futures: up almost 100 points
• S&P futures: up over 7 points
• NASDAQ: still flirting with 8,000. This site shows that the NASDAQ closed at 8,207.24 yesterday, July 18, 2019; but NASDAQ futures show it closed at 7,954 yesterday and is trading up 20.50 points in pre-market trading. I'm obviously missing something.

• NOG: down to $1.58
• JAG: down to $7.51
• SRE: great day yesterday, up $1.22 yesterday; closed at $141.17; near all-time high
• OKE: down a bit yesterday
• BA: pre-market, surging; up 2%; up almost $8/share; all I've seen is that Boeing announced what the MAX 737 write-off would be; must be a lot less than what analysts/investors expected
• BAC: up 1% yesterday 
• XLNX: had a nice day yesterday
• TSLA: back to $255 where it was in April, 2019; was as low as $178 at the end fo May, 2019