The Million Dollar Way (The Bakken Oil Blog): Knock Three Times -- April 28, 2023

Locator: 44489B.

Knock three times. When I sold books doors-to-door one summer during college, many decades ago, the Southwestern Publishing sales training folks told us that one had to tell folks something three times before they heard what one was saying.

XOM: merger -- 1998.
CVX: merger -- 2001.

XOM — hit a 52-week high today; in fact, it appears to be an all-time high.

I'm going to post this three times in case folks miss it the first two times. Then tell me the economy is getting worse.

Hess: Guyana will displace the Bakken for Hess. Sure. In 2025. Hart Energy. As a reminder, I turn the management of my portfolio over to Sophia when I turn 75 years old. Just a couple of years from now.

Bolt: Sophia won't be buying a Bolt. Barron's has thoughts on that.

CAT: link here.

The CAT I'm buying:

Or: seriously, when I see Lego sets either on "backorder," "unavailable," "limited quantities," "limit 2," or "hard to find," it's hard for me to take seriously the economy is getting worse. Link here. By the way folks are not buying Lego sets in quantity for their kids and friends. They're buying them as investments. All Lego sets are eventually retired, some sooner than others, and sets like the one below will triple in value once it's retired. Somehow -- and I don't know the backstory -- Amazon seems to have an "unlimited" supply of retired Lego sets. Lego does not sell sets directly to consumers (retail) once the set has been retired. It's very possible, Amazon -- or an Amazon re-seller or intermediary -- is buying any Lego stock directly from Lego once the product is retired. Lego announces every year which sets will be retired that year, giving retail buyers plenty of time to buy a set that will be retired.

The eight to follow today:

SLB: link here.
BRK: link here. By the way, I'll be coming back to BRK. I'm getting tired of excuses.
CVX: link here.
XOM:
CMCSA: link here.
Sony: link here.
Valero: link here.
MPC: link here.

Biggest treat today! Bloomberg shares thoughts on US shale. Whoo-hoo. And not behind a paywall.

Cost inflation, spanning everything from frack gear to laborers, is moderating after running white-hot for the last two years. A drop in natural gas drilling is freeing up rigs, trucks and materials for oil fields like those in the Permian Basin. Halliburton Co., the biggest provider of shale services, is relocating crews. In the past week, Baker Hughes Co. and SLB, the other two major service companies, warned that producer spending will grow less than expected. Helmerich & Payne Inc. is seeing a drop in demand for rigs. Lium, a research firm, said bids for fracking have slipped more than 20% since January. Halliburton was more bullish, with Chief Executive Officer Jeff Miller saying his company could defend its pricing power and that “quality services will remain tight.” But investors were less sure, with the stock failing to register a bump despite the highest first-quarter profit in more than a decade.

Chart of the day, from Bloomberg: