Notes From All Over, Early Morning Edition -- May 27, 2020

This is really quite amazing. When the Saudis tried this in 2014, it took them two years to finally throw in the towel. The current debacle is not over, and it could still deteriorate further, but the tea leaves suggest Saudi (and Russia) flinched less than four months into this ill-thought-out attempt to destroy US shale. From Rigzone: "The market has escaped a collapse."

Not all will agree -- especially several contributors over at oilprice but it certainly feels that "we've" been through the worst. But as noted, the valkyrie Brünnhilde has not yet sung.

And get this, who would have thought: the first recorded use of the phrase first appeared in ... drum roll .. The Dallas Morning News, March 10, 1976. LOL.

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Natural Gas

It is literally impossible to keep up. Moments after posting the long, rambling blog on natural gas, this headline from Rigzone: FERC greenlights Alaskk LNG project. This is a huge deal. Data points:

• the project
• North Slope, Alaska
• Alaska LNG Project
• AGDC receives FERC authorization to proceed; to construct and operate the project
• Alaska Gasline Development Corp
• Nikiski, an industrial town on Alaska's Kenai Peninsula
• 20 million metric tons per annum (MMTPA) for export
• 807-mile-long, 42-inch-diameter pipeline
• 3.9 billion cubic feet per day (650,000 boepd?)
• a gas treatment plant in Prudhoe Bay
• two additional gas pipelines
• project cost not provided at the Rigzone article, but here it is, at the project's homepage:
• projected to cost between $45 billion and $65 billion 
• joint venture, partners:
  ExxonMobil
• ConocoPhilliops
• BP
• TransCanada
• the state of Alaska
• the project will "earn massive revenues for the state"
• 9,000 to 15,000 construction jobs
• 1,000 permanent employees
• it looks like projected completion date is about 2026

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Futures

I've been following the futures all night, starting at 6:00 p.m. ET. Initially, Dow futures were down 68 points, but that quickly changed, moved into the green, and through the night all three major indices continued to climb.

A few hours before the open:

• S&P: up 23 points; up about 3/4ths of a percnet
• NASDAQ: up 72 points; up about 3/4th of a percent
• Dow: up another staggering 230 points; up about 0.95

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

For those folks who want to invest in the market, the next round of "Nancy Pelosi" stimulus checks can't arrive soon enough. What a great country.

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AAPL

Investing headlines:

• AAPL: offers attractive returns in a valuation-agnostic world, SeekingAlpha, yesterday
• Hedge funds are betting on AAPL, Yahoo!Finance, three days ago
• Will AAPL hit all-time highs soon? TheStreet, yesterday
• The Gates Foundation bought half a million AAPL shares last quarter, 9to5Mac, yesterday
• Apple stock tests alternative buy, joins fellow FAANG, Investor's Business Daily, yesterday
• Is Apple stock a buy? Motley Fool, three days ago
• AAPL: not too high, very reasonable, SeekingAlpha, four days ago
• 68% of Buffett's portfolio in these four stocks, Motley Fool, yesterday;

Berkshire Hathaway, link here:

• AAPL: $80 billion; more than 40% of Buffett's portfolio repeat: more than 40% of the total portfolio
• BofA: $22 billion
• Coca-Cola: $18 billion; Berkshire Hathaway now nets a yield based on its original cost basis of almost 51%;
• AMEX: $14 billion

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The Shadows

A BBC documentary: