Fast And Furious -- Fifteen Minutes -- November 12, 2020

Note: there will more typographical errors and content errors than usual this morning due to "situations" beyond my control. I will come back to fix these errors later this morning.

Weekly EIA petroleum report, link here. Because of the holiday, this report will be released a day later than usual, later this morning:

• US crude oil in storage increased by 4.3 million bbls;
  
• US crude oil in storage now stands at 488.7 million bbls, about 6% above the already-fat-five--year average;
  
• refiners operating at 74.5% of their operable capacity;
• distillate fuel inventories decreased by 5.4 million bls last week but are still 15% above an already-fat-five-year average;
  
• US crude oil imports averaged 5.5 million bopd, up about a half million bopd; the four-week average is about 13% less than same four-week period last year;
  
• jet fuel supplied was down 43.5% compared with same four-week period last year
  

**********************************
Did You All Notice This?

Why I Love To BlogYesterday, almost as a throwaway, I posted the following:

At oilprice, the Murban price has a one-day delay. Currently Murban is priced at $42.89, up $2.11, right in line WTI yesterday. See Murban at wiki. Almost identical to WTI, but not as light as Bakken.

• Bakken: 36° to 44° (link here)
  
• Murban: 40.2°
• WTI: 39.6°
• Brent blend: 38.3°
• Light Louisiana Sweet: 35.6°
• Saudi Arabia light: 34°

Notice, inside the box: "preferred oils." I had not seen that anywhere else -- again, another first for the blog. Wow. Love it.

**************************************
Globally, US Crude: Preferred
Singapore: Plentiful WTI Midland, Bakken Crude To Arrive

Link here. Graphic pending.

By the way, did you all note that it's not just "WTI" any more, but now it's "WTI Midland." We discussed tthat some months ago. I'll provide the link later, if I remember. 

************************************
Chinese Flu, Overnight

Lockdowns don't work, but we all knew that. What we did not know -- populations with smokers do better than populations without smokers. Link here. This was published in the #1 medical journal in the world, the London-based Lancet.  As soon as you see the link, you will "ignore it," and move on. Despite the fact it comes from the Lancet. It was published in July, 2020.

Lockdowns don't work, according to JPM. Link here.

Lockdowns don't work: Dr Faust says masks, social distancing just as good as lockdowns.

India: apparently not enough smokers. India in recession for first time ever in that nation's history, due to the Chinese flu. Link here. 

***********************************
College Football 

Updates

November 21, 2020: It just got worse. A whole lot worse. 

Original Post

 Last night I said this year's college season was dead. It was a bit harsh the way I said it. I wasn't sure I should have posted it. But I left it up. I'm glad I did.

Overnight, this story: college football limps toward the pandemic season's conclusion. From, of all places, The WSJ. Even The WSJ knows this season has been a joke. The season is in shambles. I may sound too harsh, but sometimes the truth hurts. No sugar coating this debacle. Wait until we start seeing stories of how much money the universities and colleges lost this year.

******************************
And Finally This: Another Tech Entrepreneu Flees California
Headed For .... Texas

Link here: https://www.foxbusiness.com/business-leaders/palantir-co-founder-on-moving-company-from-california-to-texas. 

I wasn't able to find a link to corroborate this story. Stories from earlier this summer said the company was moving to Denver. We'll sort this out later. All we know "for sure" is that the company is fleeing California. 

Okay, here it is, deeper in the linked story:

“I’m a builder,” he responded. “I’ve been lucky to help build over ten successful companies, we invest in a lot more and when you try to hire someone in California you pay them $250,000 a year to come there and they feel poor.” 

“You pay them that here and they are living really well,” he added, referring to Texas. “ 

So as someone who builds and has to hire a lot people, [I would] much rather do that in a place with a reasonable cost of living, that’s easy to do business.” 

Lonsdale and his investment firm reportedly moved to Austin, Texas. from San Francisco, California, driven out of The Golden State by taxes and other concerns. 

Lonsdale has followed the lead of his co-founders at the controversial data analytics firm Palantir, which also recently moved its headquarters.

In August, Palantir, which recently went public, confirmed its plans to relocate its corporate headquarters from Palo Alto, California, to Denver, Colorado. The company moved to Colorado just before its IPO, according to the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

So, if I understand this correctly, the company moved to Denver, but one of the founders has personally moved to Austin, most likely to start new companies.