AMD Income Statement, Starbucks "Active Rewards" -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44522S. 

AMD, link here;

Starbucks, link here. 

With weather turning really, really nice, now biking first thing in the morning, I'm actually stopping at different locations to blog. I have an "active rewards" card from Starbucks that I bet is at least twenty years old. It's a pretty nice-looking card. Coffee and croissants are expensive but the ambience for blogging at some Starbucks, not all, make it worthwhile.

The "rewards program" is really, really "poor" unfortunately.

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School Funding

Today Sophia said the third graders were asking for certain art supplies but their art teacher said she had no money for any more art supplies, and that makes sense -- end of the year.

But, tomorrow, Ms Morgan will get a cash donation from Sophia that will get the art class through the rest of the year! Whoo-hoo!

In addition, tonight, Sophia and I will stop by Target (or possibly Walmart) to get her some of the art supplies the students were requesting.

Sophia does that periodically for her various teachers, and it is amazing how much the teachers appreciate it and how far those teachers can make a little bit of money stretch. 

We'll do the same thing for her music teacher.

**********************
Balcony

With weather in the 80s and 90s, the balcony is now wonderful. Our balcony is on the north side of the building which is perfect. By late afternoon, it is shady, and it is absolutely gorgeous as we go into the evening. The balcony morphs into a tropical forest during the summer, and becomes a bird sanctuary. Amazing what one can do with a little bit of "land." Photos pending.

EVs Today -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44521EVs. 

From Monday, May 1, 2023:

EVs: wow, talk about a bloodbath yesterday (except for China's BYD). [Later: the bloodbath continues into Tuesday, May 2, 2023, along with a steep drop in the overall market as traders wait for "the Fed's" decision (what a crazy way to invest; I guess for traders -- to bet on JPow -- might as well go to Las Vegas -- I wonder if this is how Warren Buffett does it?).]

• RIVN: concern that even Amazon's support is not enough; down 1.33% yesterday; down 60% over one year; link here.
  
• RIDE: talking bankruptcy; link here; shares plummet; down 23% yesterday; down 81% over one year;
• FSR: down 15% yesterday; down 47% over one year;
• ARVL: down 10% yesterday; down 98% over one year;
• GOEV: up 2% yesterday; down 84% over one year;
• LCID: down 8% yesterday; down 62% over one year;
• BYD: unrelenting. In China has it come down to BYD vs TSLA? If so, TSLA will lose.

Today, Tuesday, May 2, 2023: 

• RIVN: concern that even Amazon's support is not enough; down 1.33% yesterday; down 60% over one year; link here. today, the bleeding stopped; up 0.24%.
  
• RIDE: talking bankruptcy; link here; shares plummet; down 23% yesterday; down 81% over one year; today, recovers; up 16.4% today;
  
• FSR: down 15% yesterday; down 47% over one year; and now today, down another 6%.
  
• ARVL: down 1.6% today;
  
• GOEV: down today, but only 0.26%;
• LCID: down again today, but only 0.7%;
  
• BYD: overtakes VW as #1 auto in China. Down 4% today; trading at $58.
  

Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Locator: 44520B.

Yesterday I wrote:

Today:

Crude oil inventories:

• forecast: a draw of one million bbls;
• actual, API: a draw of four million bbls;
• WTI: plunges 5%

***************************
Back to the Bakken

Active rigs: 41.

WTI: $71.66.

Natural gas: $2.214.

Four new permits, #39871 - #39874, inclusive:

• Operators: Slawson (2); Grayson Mill (2)
• Fields: Big Bend (Mountrail); Camp (McKenzie)
• Comments:
• Slawson has permits for two Diamondback wells, NWNW 21-151-92; 
• to be sited 300 FNL aand 700 FWL; and, 300 FNL and 750 FWL;
• Grayson Mill has permits for two Greenstein wells, NWNE 30-152-101; 
• to be sited 410 FNL and 2114 FEL, and 335 FNL and 2113 FEL

Five producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:

• 29723, 585, Lime Rock Resources, State Dvorak A
  
• 38805, 345, Crescent Point energy, CPEUSC Fantuz 6-13-24-158N-100W-MBH-LL,
• 38834, 1,973, Enerplus, Hay Draw 148-97-27-34-2H,
• 34489, 1,678, Neptune Operating, Novak 152-102-35-26-5H,
• 29956, 1,764, Neptune Operating, Novak 152-102-35-26-6H,

Gasoline Drops Below $3 Per Gallon -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44519B.

Gasoline: is now below $3.00 / gallon in north Texas. Whoo-hoo! 

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The Science Page

New definitions:the difference between "hominids" and "hominins":

• The most commonly used recent definitions are: 
• Hominid – the group consisting of all modern and extinct Great Apes (that is, modern humans, chimpanzees, gorillas and orang-utans plus all their immediate ancestors). 
• Hominin – the group consisting of modern humans, extinct human species and all our immediate ancestors (including members of the genera Homo, Australopithecus, Paranthropus and Ardipithecus).

The difference between "potato" and "potatoe": an "e."

And With This -- Off On A Bike Ride -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44520F.

This is pretty funny.

About six months ago I started adding RACE to my portfolio.

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.  Do not make any investment, financial, job, career, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or think you may have read here.

All my posts are done quickly: there will be content and typographical errors. If anything on any of my posts is important to you, go to the source. If/when I find typographical / content errors, I will correct them. 

Again, all my posts are done quickly. There will be typographical and content errors in all my posts. If any of my posts are important to you, go to the source.

US: Not Enough Workers -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44519E.

Not enough workers: link here.

Has this ever before been a problem for the US: not enough workers, to this extent? I don't know. 

The problem with the article:

• focuses on one state
• one assumes about the same across the US
• so that's fine
  
• BUT
• among western countries, to include Japan, my hunch: US is in a much better place 
• birth rate plus immigration
  
• Japan: has closed off all immigration for years
• birth rate:
• Germany: 1.5
• Japan: 1.34
• France: 1.83 (Muslim growth)
• England: 1.61
• US: 1.64
• China: 1.28 
• Italy: 1.24
  

Immigration (does not include the "southern surge"):

Federal Budget, Outlays, Dolllars And Percent Of GDP -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44518GS.

Link here.

Tuesday, May 2, 2023

Locator: 44518E.

Summer travel: link here. Ground-baased radar vs GPS.

Summer travel: American Airlines pilots authorize strike action.

Covid: finally.

• Biden will end Covid vaccine mandates for federal workers and international travelers
• well, that's a relief for professional tennis players

Credibility: human nature, it is what it is. 

People pick and choose what they want to believe. The Daily Beast readers "find the Daily Beast credible" until something is posted beyond the pale, as they say. So, we have this: Putin grooms Russians for defeat in Ukraine. Link here.

Putin's War: even by Ukrainian standards, this seems quite incredible -- Russia has sustained, reportedly, 100,000 casualties in five months;

• 100,000 includes 20,000 dead
• perspective
• US Vietnam dead (1955 - 1975): 58,220
• US Afghanistan (2001 - 2021): 2,402
• US Iraq (2004 - 2007: about 900 / year, each of those four years
• Russia Afghanistan (1979 - 1989): 15,000 Soviet troops

 *******************************
Back to the Bakken

Active rigs: 42.

Peter Zeihan newsletter.

WTI: $75.28.

Natural gas: $2.339.

Wednesday, May 3, 2023: 6 for the month; 58 for the quarter, 313 for the year
39261, conf, Hunt, Cook 146-93-24-13H6,
39260, conf, Hunt, Cook 146-93-24-13H5,
36404, conf, WPX, Skunk Creek 4-244-25-13H3,
31211 (no typo), conf, BR, Gladstone 6-1-13MBH,

Tuesday, May 2, 2023: 2 for the month; 54 for the quarter, 309 for the year
37176, conf, Hess, EN-Davenport-156-94-1003H-5,

RBN Energy: trading carbon across the Atlantic, part 2. 

As environmental protection and decarbonization efforts have ramped up in the past few decades, policymakers around the world have come up with a variety of schemes to lower industrial emissions.

The Kyoto Protocol in 1997 committed developed nations to reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by a defined amount from 1990 levels by 2012. The treaty was never brought up for ratification in the U.S. Senate, which unanimously opposed it because developing nations — such as China — weren’t included. Across the Atlantic, the Kyoto Protocol was received much more favorably, with all 15 members (at the time) of the European Union (EU) ratifying the treaty in 2002. In 2005, the EU launched the Emissions Trading System (ETS) as a mechanism to help reduce emissions from power plants, industrial facilities and commercial aviation, covering nearly half of total EU emissions.

In today’s RBN blog, we explain the European cap-and-trade system, examine how the ETS is affecting the EU’s refining industry as a whole, and drill down to the refinery level to discuss disparities in carbon-cost exposure from one refinery to the next.

Re-Capping A Wild, Wild Monday -- May 2, 2023

Locator: 44518EVs.

Walgreen's: best little, local retailer in my neighborhood;

• a shout out to Cheryl
• incredible customer service
• they have a customer, me, for life
• maybe more if I get caught up
• by the way, that's part of the reason why I started a position in WBA this past year (full disclosure)
  

EVs: wow, talk about a bloodbath yesterday (except for China's BYD). [Later: the bloodbath continues into Tuesday, May 2, 2023, along with a steep drop in the overall market as traders wait for "the Fed's" decision (what a crazy way to invest; I guess for traders -- to bet on JPow -- might as well go to Las Vegas -- I wonder if this is how Warren Buffett does it?).]

• RIVN: concern that even Amazon's support is not enough; down 1.33% yesterday; down 60% over one year; link here.
  
• RIDE: talking bankruptcy; link here; shares plummet; down 23% yesterday; down 81% over one year;
• FSR: down 15% yesterday; down 47% over one year;
• ARVL: down 10% yesterday; down 98% over one year;
• GOEV: up 2% yesterday; down 84% over one year;
• LCID: down 8% yesterday; down 62% over one year;
• BYD: unrelenting. In China has it come down to BYD vs TSLA? If so, TSLA will lose.
  

BP: 

• I've never seen so many "interpretations" following an earnings report; 
• some say "good" to "great"; others say, "awful."  
• one link here but many, many more if interested. I'm not. Can't make up its mind about going green.

NVDA: story of the day. 

If you've been building your position in NVDA for the past couple of years, you're feeling good now. Link here and so many more. Have fun.

Surprise?

• META and WBD. 
• Catalent and Intel (INTC). 
• Wow. Link here. 

Anticipation:

• F
• MPC
• CRC
• SBUX
• AAPL
• so many more.

Car theft?

• NYPD is encouraging car owners to install Apple AirTags; link here;
• isn't this sort of a no-brainer?
• also, put AirTags in the tennis shoes of your toddlers.

Dollar: Russian and India. This didn't turn out well.

Tax season: the rich are fleeing high-tax states?

• why? Because they can.
• link: https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/major-blue-states-hemorrhaging-adjusted-gross-income-residents-flee-irs-data-shows.
• I wish I had more time to talk about this; this is a big, big deal.
• the numbers at the link are quite amazing;

BUD:

• fire two marketing executives
• return to "business as usual"
• that's not gonna work
• lessons in how not to respond to a PR debacle.

DIS:

• another "BUD"
• Iger has his hands full
• on top of everything else, now Hollywood writers will apparently go on strike
  
• this may be the biggest business story of the year: DIS
  

US money:

• US Treasury
• The Federal Reserve
• JPM
• that's all you need to know for macroeconomics.

And the phrase: "too big to fail."

• we're talking about JPM, not the US Treasury
• looking at a default over the three-day weekend
• can JPM bail out the US government?  
  
• of course it won't happen. LOL. "It" being a US default.
  

And finally, the NBA:

• schedule
• we're down to the conference semifinals
• then the conference finals
• then the NBA championship
• look what happened;
• western conference:
• #1 vs #4 as it should be: Nuggets vs Suns
• #6 vs #7: are you kidding me?
• #6 Warriors outlast #3 Kings
• #7 Lakers -- yeah, #7 -- shouldn't even be in the playoffs, take out #2, the Grizzlies
• but it's worse: eastern conference:
• #5 vs #8 -- again, wow
• #5 Knicks taking out #4 Cavs -- okay; but,
• #8 Miami taking out #1 Bucks?
• #3 76ers vs #2 Celtics -- okay