Henry Hub Breaks Below $2.00; WTI Flirting With $74; Three Wells Coming Off Confidential List; Halo Effect Now Becoming "The Expected” -- March 29, 2023

Wow, I'm in a great mood. Up most of the night, couldn't sleep. Too much to write.

Why did "sleep" evolve? Fascinating question. Google the question. I spent some time on that overnight; it seems no one has come up with the answer -- but I have my "theory" and again, I know I'm correct. LOL.

Grammar: fascinating topic. A reader sent me this link: "English is not normal." Among many, many other reasons this article "made my day": I was introduced to another professor of linguistics, a subject I really, really enjoy. John McWhorter. Columbia University. So many personal dots to connect including B.A. from Rutgers. But there's something else about the author that blew me away. 

Frisians: quick! Name the breed of the horse that Zorro rode.

Frisian or Friesian? By the way is it Frisian or is it Friesian. My maternal grandmother was from East Frisia, and I've probably mentioned Frisia / Frisian on my various blogs more times than I care to admit. No, I enjoy admitting it.  

Nationality: so what "nationality" is a Frisian?

One day closer to summer: one day closer to swimming outdoors. 

Olivia, the soccer player. Her team has now won the first two of three "regional" games. If they win this next game, later this week, they "go to state." They are are not expected to win. On the other hand, they were also not expected to "take district," which they did -- their high school women's soccer team has now "taken district" sixteen consecutive years. Quick: name any other team, high school, college, professional that has won their "district" championship sixteen consecutive years. And this in sports-crazy Texas.

New iPhone: this should get your attention. Link here.

Apple Music Classical is here. Link here. Here. Here.

Amazon Prime never fails to surprise (and reward me). Apple just introduced their Classical Music app which will be / is "free" with an Apple Music subscription ($99 / year; $4.99/month for college students. What I did not know: Apple Music is "free" (better said, no additional cost) for those with Amazon Prime. But there is a "catch." That "catch" confuses things but bottom line: with Amazon Prime, one has full access to all Apple music. Link here. Not the best link; other links better. 

Too many apps? Could apps disappear? Amazon may have opened that door. My hunch: most iPhone users are getting frustrated with the look of their screen -- cluttered with "pages" of apps, most of which are seldom used but, in the user's mind, critical. Yes, they also end up using a lot of memory and energy. Yes, I know, apps can be turned on / off; data won't be lost.

Amazon Music catalog: link here.

The equity market: never fails to surprise. Not entirely true, but today that adage seems true. If the Dow follows through with it's pre-market enthusiasm, it suggests that traders feel the risk of a banking collapse is trending toward zero.

The oil market: "they" say the price of WTI is climbing because of the spat between Iraq and Kurdistan. Perhaps. I doubt it.

Ukraine:

• Russia's winter offensive: it failed.
• Ukraine hit major target deep behind the "front line."
• Growing talk from Kyiv of a counterassault against Russian forcees worn out by a failed witner offensive.
• All from today's Reuters briefing.
• Peter Zeihan "predicted" this six months ago.
• Remember: Russian forces are now paid mercenaries.

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Back to the Bakken

Active rigs: 44.

Peter Zeihan newsletter: with regard to Urkainee, the Japanese "get it." Unlike the GOP and Mr Trump.

WTI: pre-market, flirting with $74.

Natural gas: breaks below $2.00. Oh-oh.

Thursday, March 30, 2023:
3550, conf (no typo), Empire North Dakota, Waddle-Olson 1,
38864, conf, Liberty Resources, CA S 158-93-21-23-5MBHX,
38762, conf, Whiting, Locken 12-11TFX,

Wednesday, March 29, 2023: 88 for the month: 252 for the quarter, 252 for the year
39246, conf, KODA Resources, Bock 32-1 SWD,
39193, conf, CLR, Allen 6-17H,
38439, conf, Hess, EN-Farhart-LW-156-93-0409H-1

RBN Energy: a twofer.

Plans for energy development largely rest on fate of US permitting reform. Posted yesterdday, also.

E&Ps reap record 2022 profits, but eroding 4Q22 returns harken a ess idyllic 2023. Perhaps.

Last August, we titled our review of Q2 2022 E&P financial results Camelot after rising oil prices and surging natural gas realizations drove revenues, profits and cash flows to levels that seemed like an unrealizable dream for producers that had teetered on the brink of financial instability just two years before. Recent year-end results revealed the strongest returns in the industry’s history, much of which were distributed to long-suffering shareholders. But dreams fade and prices retreat, and Q4 2022 results suggest a far less idyllic 2023. In today’s RBN blog, we review the record 2022 performance and more sobering Q4 results.

After struggling to keep their heads above water since 2014, the 42 E&Ps in the universe of companies we track — which includes every publicly held U.S. E&P with a market capitalization over $500 million, but not integrated energy companies like ExxonMobil and Chevron — recorded back-to-back record profitable years in 2021 and 2022. These producers earned $82 billion in pre-tax operating profit in 2021 then doubled those results to $167 billion in 2022. As shown in Figure 1, the gap between E&P revenue (in dollars per barrel of oil equivalent, or $/boe; gray line) and costs (multicolored bars) is negligible to negative between 2015-20, with soaring profitability in 2021 and 2022 (white-space gap above bars) driven by healthy commodity prices and fiscally disciplined operating and capital expenditures.