This Pipeline Is Dead -- A CO2 Pipeline -- Iowa To North Dakota -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45415B.  

Updates

August 19, 2023: update. Link here. Archived. Nothing new; just a re-hash of the original story. Operator still thinks the pipeline will be operational by the end of 2024. Summit is based in Iowa.

Original Post

Link here.

If you read this story carefully, particularly "between the lines," as they say, you will see this pipeline is dead. This is "more dead" than the Keystone XL.

Have you seen how much an acre of farmland sells for in Iowa? No way is the state or the farmers going to take a chance ruining their farmland.

This CCS project has nothing for the Iowa farmer. It only benefits Summit and a few folks in North Dakota. Iowa farmers aren't worried about North Dakota or Summit; they are appropriately worried about their own farmland.

2022:

NFL Football ls Back -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45414B.

Biggest story today: regulators give free rein to driverless taxis in San Francisco. This is absolutely huge.

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Dividends -- Recent Announcements

Link here.

• Enerplus: an increase.
• TSM: a decrease
• Diageo: an increase (a recent Buffett buy)
• FOX: an increase
• CHRD: an increase -- whoo-hoo!
• SWKS (Skyworks): an increase -- whoo-hoo!

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NFL

On now: Houston Texans vs New England Patriots, NFL Network Live, Hulu.

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Music

With almost everything, I go through phases.

Music: I’m clearly in my Christies’ Yellow River phase.

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Salads

Current phase: Caprese salad. Perfect accompaniment to 106-degree weather. 

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Politics

Pelosi's long game: the Trump indictment. The Intelligencer. 

This is why "term limits" would be bad. 

Same with President Biden. It's up to the voters and the US Congress to sort this out. Not arbitrary laws.

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Courts

Recently I mentioned that I sold all my JNJ due to the unresolved court case.

This was in The WSJ today. 

This speaks volumes and tells me I made the right decision for me. 

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Amazon

As an investment, Amazon is looking more and more attractive. I've never cared for third party sellers on Amazon. This will eliminate some of the bad actors, I suppose, but that's not the reason Amazon is doing this:

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X Vs Threads

From the CEO of X: link here.

Atmospheric CO2 -- July 2023

Locator: 45413CO2.

Month-over-month, a slight decrease, but that's seasonal and occurs every July. Year-over-year, the typical increase.

Link here.

XTO Renews Twenty-One Permits; Three DUCs Reported As Completed; Three New Permits -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45412B,

WTI: $82.82 (and folks are complaining; it gets tedious).

Heavy oil: link here. Incredible story. That's why I'm so "excited" about this week's COP story and Athabasca. Renewable diesel is a joke when one considers how much diesel is and will be needed. But go ahead, keep reading about renewable diesel. It gets tedious.

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Back to the Bakken

Active rigs: 39.

Three permits approved, #40117 - #40119, inclusive:

• Operator: Neptune Operating
• Field: Ft Buford (Williaams); Briar Creek (Williams)
• Comments: 
• Neptune Operating has permit for three Heen / Heen South wells, SWSE 35-153-104; 
• to be sited 375 FSL and between 2381 FFEL and 2447 FEL

Twenty-one (21) permits renewed:

• XTO: three Edwards Trust permits; four Bjarne Federal / HBU Bjarne Federal permits; fourteen HBU Marmon / HBU Marmon Federal permits; various fields, Williams and McKenzie counties

Three producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:

• 39531, 1,502, Grayson Mill, Charles 3-10 3H,
• 39141, 1,616, CLR, Micahlucas 10-5H1,
• 39141, 1,464, CLR, Micahlucas 7-5H,

It Gets Tedious -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45411GERMANY.

Link here.

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More Of The Same

The link.

For those who are interested, the thread at the link goes on and on and on. Here are just the first four screenshots:

SCCO, one year:

And then this from a few months ago, re-posting;

Original Post

Locator: 45902ECON.

Exhibit A

Link here. 

Exhibit B

WTI, LNG, NG:

For The Archives -- Inflation. Again. August 10, 2023

Locator: 45410INF.

In a sidebar e-mail discussion, I replied to a reader with this not-ready-for-prime-time comment regarding US inflation.

For the archives. This will become part of a longer post on inflation.

Inflation for me is a data point, an interesting number, but not more than that. About as interesting as knowing what today's temperature will be. 

I don't know anything about bonds, and I don't make any (conscious) investment decisions based on inflation numbers.

I find it interesting that most folks who don't trust government numbers at all, trust government inflation numbers completely.

For me, I used to trust government numbers implicitly, never gave them another thought. But after the EIA numbers two weeks ago, I don't even trust the EIA reports any more. 

I guess like Reagan, "trust, but verify."

Two weeks ago, the EIA reported the largest drop ever in US crude oil supplies (which was impossible for that much oil to disappear) and the movers and shakers knew that, and the price of oil actually dropped. [With that much oil disappearing, WTI should have surged; it didn't. Folk knew it was impossible for that much to disappear. Gasoline demand had been plummeting for four weeks, many refiners were shut down for maintenance or high summer heat, and export/import numbers had not changed.]

This past week, another large crude oil number but this time, the supply increased by a significant amount. The price of oil should drop; it didn't, it increased. Again, the movers and shakers know something's afoot and appear to be ignoring the EIA reports.

It also appears that the EIA and API (American Petroleum Institute) are using the same data points and yet can (but not always) come up with wildly different numbers. Investment analysts rely on EIA numbers but not API numbers, from what I see.

So, for me inflation numbers are simply a data point -- a data point that has become nothing more than political commentary. 

I know I'm in good company because Warren Buffett has implied just as much: he makes deals, looks for deals regardless of what the economy is doing. Regardless of inflation he parks his money where he gets his best return while waiting for best opportunity to pounce. I don't understand any of that, so I just invest as much money as I have available every two weeks. 

I won't time the market, certainly not on inflation numbers and certainly not based on government figures.  

Note: UPS drivers, $170,000.

Note: UAW workers looking for a 49% wage hike over the duration of the new four-year contract.

Gasoline Demand -- Julianne Geiger Has It Right -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45409GASOLINEDEMAND.

Link here.

Some readers have suggested that declining gasoline demand is due to more EVs on the road. LOL.

Impossible. 

Julianne Geiger has it exactly right: decades of more stringent CAFE standards are finally being felt, and now Americans can driver further, use less gasoline. Link here.

If that was the only factor, the downward trend in gasoline demand (seasonally adjusted) should have been a fairly straight line.

But it isn't. The decrease in gasoline demand is not following a gradually, declining straight line. 

The line is very choppy. Why? Covid-19.

During Covid-19, work-from-home (WFH) was the norrm.

Folks that post Covid-19, things would change.

They have, but not much. Upwards of 65% of workers are not returning to the hives where the work gets done.

EV penetration? Inconsequential. It's the "Norway effect." 

Dissing DIS, Part 2 -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45407DIS. 

Updates

August 15, 2023: reminder when Bob Iger returned -- 

Original Post

Link here:

Flashback:

In a note to a reader, not-ready-for-prime-time:

Everyone expected Bob Iger’s magic to turn the Magic Kingdom around. 

Instead, he does what all struggling companies do: cut costs (cancel projects and fire employees) and raise prices. 

No magic bullets. No big deals. No out-of-the-box thinking. No imagination from the darling of Wall Street. 

DIS+ continues to fall and loses subscribers. 

Shares: one year — 22% loss, though DIS is up 2% today.

From The WSJ, link here:

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The Book Club 

Genius: The Life And Science Of Richard Feynman, James Gleick, c. 1992.

Notes.

Inflation Surprise! Market Surges -- August 10, 2023

Locator: 45406B. 

CPI: most-watched indicator comes in lower than expected. 

• Mmarket surges. Stays with a 3-handle. And GDPNow with a 4-handle. Goldilocks economy? 
• again, called it.
• CNBC's darling chartist Carter's 9% correction will have to wait.

Recession obsession: Alibaba stock jumps as earnings smash estimates. Link here.

Inflation: I flip-flop on this issue almost weekly it seems, but at the end-of-the-day, as they say, this is pretty much what I've said over the years with regard to CPI, energy and food inflation. This was my not-ready-for-prime-time reply to a reader who suggested (as Yahoo!Finance also does) that increasing gasoline prices this month will drive higher food prices and higher inflation numbers next month:

Great news for me. My portfolio will do quite well, and gasoline demand has plummeted -- data posted weekly by the EIA -- and like US postage stamps, it's not how much a stamp costs or how much a gallon of gasoline costs, it's how much one spends on each, every month. 

I send almost nothing on postage each month; between e-mail and Amazon, almost no postage costs.

Gasoline: upwards of 65% of workers now work from home three days a week -- biggest driver of gasoline demand in the US.

Gasoline demand, contrary to the memes, has very little effect on price of goods on a day-to-day, month-to-month basis. And as diesel prices go up and truck shipping prices go up, companies move to ship by rail. [Buffett's BRK-BNSF; and, for me, UNP.]

I've seen very, very little correlation between the economy and the price of gasoline in the big scheme of things. 

Gasoline has been very, very high this summer, and inflation? Down.

See stories on likely social security increases next year. Bad news for seniors as inflation rates come down.

Restaurant costs: the big inflation problem for Americans -- spending $100 on a restaurant meal they could prepare at home for $10 - $25. Then add in the $10-cocktail at "cheap" restaurants, and upwards fo $25 at really nice restaurants.

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Back to the Bakken

WTI: $83.67.

Friday, August 11, 2023: 18 for the month; 220 for the quarter, 475 for the year

39567, conf, CLR, Edward 3-23H,

Thursday, August 10, 2023: 17 for the month; 219 for the quarter, 474 for the year
39455, conf, CLR, Edward 4-23H1,

38915, conf, Enerplus, MC-Kudrna 144-95-10-3-5H,

RBN Energy: clean methanol gains momentum as a shipping fuel of the near-future.