Housing Starts Surge — Unexpected — Recession? What Recession? June 26, 2023

Locator: 45077ECON.

Link here.

Tesla Deliveries -- Data Pending -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45076TSLA.

Link here.

Tesla is slated to announce record deliveries for the second quarter, probably on Sunday, July 2, 2023.

Wall Street predicts Tesla deliveries growing 74% to 445,000, according to FactSet.

The big year-over-year increase reflects easy comparisons to Q2 2022, when Tesla's Shanghai plant was shut down for Covid lockdowns for several weeks. Also, the Berlin and Austin, Texas, plants were slowly ramping up output.

On Monday, Deutsche Bank raised its TSLA stock price target to 230 from 200, and maintained a buy rating on the shares. The firm revised its estimates for Q2 deliveries to 448,000 units, above analyst consensus. Deutsche Bank predicts about 168,000 vehicles sold in North America, 153,000 in China, 87,000 in Europe and 23,000 in the rest of the world.

Another Tech Deal -- Buffett's Favorite Involved -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45075TECH.

Link here.

Both NVDA and SNOW dropped significantly today.

High-Speed Internet For All -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45074TECH.

High-speed internet.

Another win for America.

I think this has been talked about for decades. I remember wondering why South Korea was years (decades?) ahead of us in this arena. The US shouldn't be #2 in anything. LOL.

No president was able to get it funded until Mr Biden.

Period.

Dot.

Link here.

President Joe Biden today announced how $42 billion in funding to bolster broadband internet access will be allocated. The investment, which was funded by the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, aims to give all Americans access to high-speed internet by 2030.

Texas is getting the largest slice of funding with $3.3 billion. Eighteen other states are receiving over $1 billion, including Alabama, California, Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Virginia and Washington.

Every state is getting at least $107 million. Several US territories are included in the program, with $27 million allocated to the US Virgin Islands receiving and $334 million earmarked for Puerto Rico.

"With these allocations and other Biden administration investments, all 50 states, DC and the territories now have the resources to connect every resident and small business to reliable, affordable high-speed internet by 2030," the White House said in a statement.

Last year, the White House announced an initiative that would allocate at least $100 million to each state through the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program. The remainder of the funding was on hold until the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) drew up a more detailed coverage map showing which homes and businesses lacked high-speed internet access. The funding will be allocated based on the map.

The FCC released its first draft of the overhauled map, which incorporates more granular data, in November. Still, politicians on both sides of the aisle were concerned it left out millions of businesses and homes and urged the White House to delay the broadband funding efforts until issues were resolved.

Another one of my pet peeves. With as "rich" as the US is, we still don't have high-speed internet for all in this country. It's not as if we don't have enough money. 

The EV Of The Future -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45073EVS. 

See: FF-91 Future.

From the linked article:

Faraday Future has officially launched its long delayed FF 91 electric vehicles, including a limited edition called the Futurist Alliance that carries a pretty hefty price tag of $309,000.

That's even more expensive than the $249,000 Lucid Air Sapphire, a "ultra-high-performance" EV with similar specs. The company's FF 91 2.0 Futurist model will sell for the same price as the Air Sapphire at $249,000, while the base FF 91 2.0, which is expected to be the most affordable of the three, doesn't have pricing yet.

Both the FF91 2.0 Futurist Alliance and Futurist models are powered by three electric motors and can go from 0 to 60mph in 2.27 seconds. The 1050 horsepower vehicles can go as fast as 155 mph, and their 142kWh battery can sustain a range of approximately 381 miles — shorter than the range of a Tesla Model S but longer than a Model Y's. They both have the same "zero gravity" seats that have a large recline angle for comfort, as well as 27-inch rear passenger displays.

And people think the Apple Vision Pro is expensive at $3,500.

*********************
We Might Come Back To This Later

From The Atlantic. June, 2023.

 

EVs Update -- It Will Get Much Worse Before It Gets Better -- If It Ever Gets Better -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45072EVS.
Locator: 45063EVS.

Re-posting.

EVs: tracked here.

See: FF-91 Future.

See: China's "Tesla Killer" tumbles as EV price war takes toll.  

EVs: tracked here.

EVs:

• must-read story today; The WSJ; brings us up-to-date on the sorry excuse for EVs
• link here;
• how bad is it: this is the big FT story on EVs today:
• Aston-Martin ditched Mercedes; will buy its batteries from US-based Lucid
• what's this all about?
• three guesses and first two don't count

Hess Gets Permit #40000 -- Very Appropriate -- And In Ray Oil Field -- Almost Where Oil Production Began In North Dakota In 1951 -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45071B.

Active rigs: 37.

WTI: $69.47.

Five new permits, #39998 - #40002, inclusive:

• Operator: Hess
• Field: Ray (Williams)
• Comments: Hess has five permits for three GO-State wells and two GO-Hoyt wells, NWNE 28-157-97; to be sited 425 FNL and between 1509 FEL and 1641 FEL.

Two permits renewed:

• 35075, Oasis, Slagle, Camp, McKenzie
• 35076, Oasis, Slagle, Camp, McKenzie

Buc-ee's! They Just Opened The World's Largest Service Station -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45070TX.
Locator: 45070BUCC-EES. 

Link here.

Do a Buc-ee’s word search on the blog to see how much I love this service station. Wow.

At 74,000 square feet, these are in the same ballpark as Walmart stores. And the Buc-ee's have a much, much larger footprint with its pumps.

Sevierville, Tennessee. Midway between the turnoff of I-40 on the way to Gatlinburg. 

Is Dollyland one word or two?

The world's largest service station, today, won't hold that record for long:

Luling, TX, is near another huge theme park, on I-10, east of San Antonio to Houston.

But it's at that location for that reason: New Braunfels.

Tech Updates -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45069AAPL. 

SCOTUS: apparently the court doesn't want to be dragged into these kind of cases. For tech you win some, you lose some.  It appears the justices are over-weighted in GOOG and under-weighted in AAPL. Tim Cook needs to go fishing with the Chief Justice.

GM: it always amazes me how long it takes for big companies to "pivot."

PFE -- Trending -- But Not For A Good Reason -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45068INV.

One of the reasons I tend not to invest in Big Pharma. I do hold a small position in PFE and it's one of my long-term holding.

Usual disclaimers.

Kroger Raises Dividend for 17th Consecutive Year -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45067INV. 

Link here.

See this post from June 22, 2023. I knew it had to be wrong -- somehow, either I or the sources mixed up the quarterly dividend and annual dividend. Whatever. It now makes more sense. 

It's interesting that other sources had this data last week and yet it's now being reported as if the news just broke. It's all very weird.

From the link today:

Be that as it may, Kroger is having a great year. Obviously the company is managing inflation just fine even if it means raising the price of a loaf of white bread from 99 cents (pre-Covid) to $1.59 (post-Covid).

The usual disclaimers apply.

Sunny Days -- "It Is Here" -- Again -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45066WTI. 

*********************
The Book Page

Today's book to start:

• The World Broke in Two: Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, E. M. Forster, and the Year That Changed Literature, Bill Goldstein, c. 2017, 823GOL. 
• In Search of Mary Shelley: The Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein, Fiona Sampson, c. 2018. It's irritating to me to call an 18-year-old woman a "girl," especially one who wrote in the early 1800s.
  
• Notes here.
  

From the introduction:

• Willa Cather
• her 1936 book of essays, Not Under Forty 
• she made the melancholy remark at the beginning of the book: "The world broke in two in 1922 or thereabouts."

• Cather was thinking of:
• Ulysses, February, 1922
• The Waste Land, October, 1922

All at once these two books seemed to herald a new modernist era in which the form of story telling (that) she (Cather)  prized, and had excelled at, was no longer of signal importance. 

Comments: This is incredibly important and incredibly interesting for me. Years ago I put together my "history" of literature which I use to discuss literature with the grandchildren. In my "diary" it is Chapter 24 and runs to 43 pages. I occasionally add to it but most additions are now elsewhere. I wanted the "chapter" to show what my thoughts were when I first wrote it back in 2006 or thereabouts.

If the author chooses 1922 as the year the world (literature) broke, then the author needs to pick the year Romanticism began: 1749, with Rosseau’s essay. That period ended with the death of Goethe. But I digress.

*************************
101 Days Of Summer -- Day 30

Going biking.

Wow, these days are gorgeous.

I'm going biking. I'll bike five miles to the library. 

*************************
American Grammar

The never-ending argument: It's her or it's she?

Link here.

Perhaps, the best response, the one I like best:  

For another controversy, see who vs whom. Link here, usage.

This Is Pathetic -- On A Good Day For Oil -- Oh, Never Mind -- It's Worse Than I Thought -- And I'm An Optimist -- LOL -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45065WTI. 

The Energy Institute Statistical Review of World Energy, 2022, has just been released.

So, after all this data was released,

• solar and wind ddn’t dent fossil fuels,
• global economy is ready to surge post-Covid, 
• Saudi Arabia cuts production, 
• Russia almost stages a coup, 
• and .... and .... and ... and ..

What did WTI do today?

• can't break $70
• surges ... by 19 cents -- disregard -- that was pre-market ---
  
• up ... by 0.27% -- disregard -- that was pre-market ---

Now that the market has opened,

• didn't break $70
• drops half-a-percent
• trading below $69
• looks like WTI will close slightly up but below $70
• and this is on a "good news" day for oil.

And the lead story over at Oilprice.com: Saudi Arabia could slash oil supply to the US.

OMG.

Seriously.

That's the headline. That's the top story. Slash. Pretty scary word.

OMG.

On that news, WTI drops half-a-percent. And the huge July 4th this weekend -- and a long weekend -- five days -- people will start leaving Friday -- Monday is the "who cares -- tomorrow is the holiday -- I will just call in sick" day -- five days ... 

Does anyone pay attention to data any more?

Saudi Arabia oil to US -- historical -- link here. 

Remember, Saudi has a huge refinery in the US -- unless they want to buy Permian oil for that refinery, they can't "slash" much.

I guess it depends on the definition of "slash."

Oh, here we go ... WTI is starting to move ... up 15 cents .... trading at $69.31.

Good luck to all. I'm going biking.

On A Great Day For Oil -- WTI Surges -- Up 19 Cents -- Can't Break $70 -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45064WTI.

The Energy Institute Statistical Review of World Energy, 2022, has just been released.

So, after all this data was released, solar and wind don't dent fossil fuels and global economy is ready to surge post-Covid, and Saudi Arabia cuts production, and Russia almost stages a coup, and .... and .... and ... and ..

What did WTI do today:

• can't break $70
• surges ... by 19 cents
• up ... by 0.27%
• and this is on a "good news" day for oil.

The real stories.

Bloomberg leads with this today:

Global electrical generation by fuel, link here:

European electrical generation by fuel, link here:

Global energy consumption, link here (at the link, the screenshot only shows through 2013; click on the graphs to go out to 2022):

Renewables growth did not dent fossil fuel dominance in 2022, link here:

Oil and the Russian coup, link here:

Saudis "tightening" the screws on America, link here:

Saudi in deep doo-doo, link here:

Wind energy: read the small print. Link to Bloomberg. How charts confuse folks.

EVs -- Update -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45063EVS.

See: FF-91 Future.

See: China's "Tesla Killer" tumbles as EV price war takes toll.  

EVs: tracked here.

EVs:

• must-read story today; The WSJ; brings us up-to-date on the sorry excuse for EVs
• link here;
• how bad is it: this is the big FT story on EVs today:
• Aston-Martin ditched Mercedes; will buy its batteries from US-based Lucid
• what's this all about?
• three guesses and first two don't count
• link here; archived.

Aston Martin has ditched a plan to buy batteries from Mercedes-Benz and instead struck a deal with Lucid that will see the US start-up take a stake in the struggling luxury-car maker.

The agreement with Lucid will allow Aston to escape a series of financial commitments it made to Mercedes, which is a significant shareholder in the UK company, in a deal struck in 2020.

Aston has had a bruising life on the stock market since its initial public offering in 2018, with the group’s pre-tax loss more than doubling last year. After leading an investment in Aston in 2020, Canadian tycoon Lawrence Stroll is attempting to revive its fortunes and push the group into electric vehicles.

The carmaker plans to integrate Lucid’s batteries and driving units into its electric models, which it intends to roll out in 2025. Alongside the transfer of technology, Lucid will take a 3.7 per cent stake in Aston and receive up to £186mn in cash and shares.

No Wells Coming Off Confidential List Today; None Over The Weekend And Only One Tomorrow -- June 26, 2023

Locator: 45062B.

Bizarre: no matter how you look at it, it was bizarre -- that military action in Russia over the weekend.

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

WTI: $69.78.

Tuesday, June 27, 2023: 38 for the month; 146 for the quarter, 401 for the year
39305, conf, CLR, Meadowlark FIU 10-6H,

Monday, June 26, 2023: 37 for the month; 145 for the quarter, 400 for the year
None.

Sunday, June 25, 2023: 37 for the month; 145 for the quarter, 400 for the year
None.

Saturday, June 24, 2023: 37 for the month; 145 for the quarter, 400 for the year
None.

RBN Energy: wildfires, pipeline maintenance punish western Canadian gas production.

Western Canada’s natural gas production has been on a roll in the past couple of years, reaching a record 17.3 Bcf/d in 2022. Another year of strong growth was expected in 2023, but Mother Nature had other plans — as usual. First, a milder-than-average heating season left plenty of gas in storage, pushing natural gas prices lower across North America. Second, tinder-dry conditions in some of the best gas production areas in Alberta and British Columbia sparked what so far has been a very active wildfire season — and forced producers to curtail their gas output numerous times in May and June. From our early expectations for production growth of 1.2 to 1.4 Bcf/d this year, the impacts from wildfires and a healthy dose of pipeline maintenance has chopped our 2023 production growth outlook to just 0.4 Bcf/d. As we discuss in today’s RBN blog, this slowdown in growth is exactly the opposite of what’s needed to avoid a runup in prices. Strong production momentum will be required into 2024 and 2025 to deal with the startup of the LNG Canada export facility, ongoing Canadian gas demand growth and pipeline exports to the U.S.