Notes From All Over -- Part 1 -- The Friday The Thirteenth Edition -- May 13, 2022

Headline of the day (yesterday): US oil pipeline operators are gearing up for higher shale output. Link here to Reuters, the most trusted name in energy. Writer: Arathy Somasekhar.

Because it's "Friday the thirteenth" I won't be leaving my bedroom today.

NDIC website: looks like this will be the fifth day without the "new" website."

WTI: $107.70 and trending higher as the US Congress continues to move the bill forward to control the price of gasoline sold at wholesale or retail. If that happens, I assume US becomes dependent on European oil from France and Spain.

RBN Energy: Yawn. Price trends could pave the way to greater EV adoption, or obstruct it, part 2.

Electric vehicles (EVs) in the U.S. may be at a turning point, with high gasoline prices prompting would-be car buyers to give them a second look — or a first look, in many cases. EV adoption has been slow to pick up speed in the U.S. for a variety of reasons, including the lack of a nationwide charging network and concerns about “range anxiety.” But a major factor has always been that gasoline-fueled cars have been cheaper to purchase and operate than EVs. The recent run-up in gasoline prices, amplified by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, has changed the math in those comparisons, at least in the short-term. Is the pace of EV adoption about to accelerate, or will trends in gasoline and electric power prices put the transition into cruise control, or even neutral? In today’s RBN blog, we look at how forecasts for power and gasoline prices might shape the conversations around EVs through 2030.

Peter Zeihan: the energy transition is dead; we just don't know it yet.

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The blog is severely limited with regard to the Bakken right now: the NDIC website remains down for the fifth day in a row.

Twitter: Elon Musk's plan to acquire twitter in jeopardy. I posted that a couple days ago, pretty much in passing, and now it's hitting the mainstream business pages.

Chart of the day: US refining margins surge to a fresh all-time high; above $55 per barrel -- that's the margin. Link here. The chart is posted at that link.

I didn't get that excited about the chart; what interested me was the WTI 3-2-1 crack spread. The question is why the crack spread is not WTI 3-1-2? 

The answer? The Keystone XL was killed. Not enough heavy oil to make enough heating oil, diesel to meet demand. I guess that's not correct. Refiners are meeting demand ... but just at a very high price for consumers.

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Diesel

Links:

• major truck stop chains Loves and Pilot are warning about imminent diesel shortage on the East Coast; link here. 
• This was the first reply: "So wouldn't they raise prices and that would decrease diesel usage a bit." 
• So out of touch. In his/her defense, he/she is not American, as far as I can tell. Never lived through the OPEC embargo back in 1973. The current diesel situation looks as bad as that event, but in a different way, and, yes, California's response was to ration gasoline sales.
• ZeroHedge has the story here.
• Major trucking fleets across the eastern half of the US are preparing for an "imminent" diesel shortage, according to logistics firm FreightWaves. Founder and CEO of FreightWaves Craig Fuller said "3 very large fleets" are preparing for diesel pumps at fuel stations to run dry. Drivers of these fleets received notifications about fuel shortages that could materialize in the coming weeks across the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions.

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Natural Gas 

Links:

• prices to surge: EIA predicting $8.59 Henry Hub for last six months as storage struggles to keep up. Nancy Pelosi needs to write another "price-gouging" bill. I hope she includes the price of eggs in this bill.
• demand to rise in 2022 --EIA: link here. Whatever happened to energy transition?
• US LNG exports to reach -- get this -- 11.99 bcfd iin 2022 -- give me a break -- this is an estimate -- why "11.99"? Just call it "12." I guess "11.99" makes it sound more ... well, scientific.
• exports to reach 12.63 bcfd in 2023; my hunch: 12.65; just a hunch and some back-of-the-enveloped doodling -- actually I just combined the number of months in a year and the "usual retirement age" for Americans

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Automobile Manufacturers / EVs

Rivian: burning cash like crazy -- key point in Rivian's earnings -- Barron's.

• 1Q22: Rivian's letter to shareholders here -- incredible photos; small print not so good.
• 1Q22: Rivian earnings here -- CNBC.
• demand remains "high"
• production is on track
• what we're not seeing: profitability; timelines; margins; dividends.
• Cathy Wood? Buying GM.
  

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Airlines

For the Geico Rock community: air fares are going up. One wonders if the Pelosi-bill will include price gouging by airlines? Airlines should have been storing aviation fuel when oil was sub-$30.

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Inflation

Notes:

• inflation is not a concern:
• if you are not buying a used car;
• if you don't eat; and,
• if you don't use energy.
• core CPI us 0.57% month-over-month; higher than expected. And, I guess, longer than expected.
• year-over-year: 8.3%; forecast: 8.1%; previous: 8.5%
• things are never so bad, they can't get worse.
  

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Ticket to Success

NBA raises ticket prices as attendance plummets:

• https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2022/05/11/report-nba-raises-ticket-prices-attendance-plummets/.
• Pelosi is not warning about NBA-ticket-price gouging.

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Putin's War

Which countries rely most on Russian gas? Great graphic. Peter Zeihan.

Finland next?