Notes From All Over -- Including One Story About The Bakken -- July 18, 2020

Best thing about getting old: sleep patterns. LOL.

Nope, just kidding, best thing about getting old: the pool of attractive people to watch gets larger and larger.

Melt down. Shale oil? Nope, Bryson DeChambeau. Pencils a "10" on the 15th hole just before the cut. Goes from +1  (makes the cut) to +6 (does not make the cut) on one hole, just three holes from the end. Wow. Won't accept ruing from first official; gets second opinion on the ruling: same outcome. Quickly becoming the white Bubba on the PGA tour.

Obamacare: a federal appeals court supports Trump on ruling. Amazing. Good news for those who need less expensive health insurance.

Finally got the memo. Ten years late. Daimler to stop building sedans in the US after 2Q20 loss. Will now, finally, focus on high-margin SUVs. Why did it take so long? Don't they read the blog about cheap oil? Hopefully the company is not late to the EV bandwagon.

New York not broke: anyone following the news knows that the governor of New York is concerned about the states finances, suggesting the state may be broke. If so, not that broke. New York will invest almost a billion dollars to expand EV infrastructure.

Which reminds me: what's the status of the California debacle previously known as the bullet train? From the LA Times: California high-speed rail board delays key finance plan after lawmakers push back.

Following a stunning rebuke by the State Assembly, the board of California’s high-speed rail authority this week put off approving a crucial 2020 business plan, a sign it has agreed to reassess the project’s current blueprint.

The authority’s board had planned to routinely approve the business plan at a meeting scheduled for Thursday and submit it to the Legislature as it has done every two years over the last decade.

The plan formally laid out a $20.4 billion blueprint to build a partial operating system in the San Joaquin Valley under a massive 30-year contract that would be issued this year.

But earlier this month, the Assembly approved a resolution that called on the rail authority to delay that contract and reassess the entire strategy of putting all of the remaining bullet train funds into the single stretch of high speed rail between Bakersfield and Merced.

More insanity: electric truck startup Nikola is worth more than Chrysler, according to one analyst.

Not insane? Warren Buffett may have found a stock he actually likes. His own. 

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

Barron's: The Bakken

This is behind a paywall, but if you are able to access it, it's worth it. The link: https://www.barrons.com/articles/u-s-oil-companies-are-drilling-again-heres-whos-ramping-up-51595014332. You might be able to find using typical Google tricks.

Oil companies are starting to increase their drilling again, after months where they shut off wells or postponed projects. Their decisions in the months ahead, along with the path of Covid-19 could determine the longer-term trajectory of oil stocks.

After a volatile spring, oil prices have been trading around $40 a barrel for the past few weeks. Analysts don’t expect them to rise above $50 a barrel until there are more signs demand is returning -- a question mark as Covid-19 surges in the U.S.

Other countries are starting to pump more oil, too. OPEC said this week that it planned to gradually increase production.

Regarding the Bakken:

In June, the number of permits to drill wells in the U.S. rose by 15% on a month-over-month basis off a “brutal” May bottom, noted Evercore ISI analyst James West in a note. In total, federal authorities approved 1,238 permits — 126 more oil permits and 40 more gas permits than the prior month.

Small and midsize oil companies have had trouble getting financing to drill, but larger explorers and producers have fared better. Exxon Mobil andChevron both raised billions of dollars in the credit markets after Covid-19 began to spread.

The majors, which include Exxon, Chevron, and European oil companies likeRoyal Dutch Shell account for a large share of the increased drilling permits.

Of the independent explorers and producers, Devon Energy andDiamondback Energy are expanding their presence in the Permian basin—the most productive oil basin in the U.S.—applying for drilling permits for 31 and 12 wells, respectively.

There is also more activity in the Bakken formation, which is in North Dakota and Montana. The companies adding the most wells there include ConocoPhillips and Marathon Oil, up 21 and 15 wells respectively.