In My Infrastructure, Big Cap Bucket -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46644CRH.

Link here. The way Sylvia always looks at Ian is always so wonderful.

Link here. 

From the link:

Construction materials and services company CRH reported solid fourth-quarter numbers.

What’s more, management’s outlook for 2024 shows U.S. construction fundamentals are fine. CRH on Thursday reported full-year earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, or Ebitda, of $6.5 billion based on international accounting standards and $6.2 billion based on U.S. accounting standards.

I added to my "Strong Buy Commitment For The Long Term, Infrastructure, Big Cap" about six months ago.

Replaced Deere.

This Must Be A Mistake -- This Can't Be Real -- Needs To Be Fact-Checked -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46643ONEOK.

If this is accurate, I'm quitting the blog and moving to the South Pacific.  

WMB is one of my biggest holdings. After reading the 10-K each year, I just keep adding to my position.

But as noted, this needs to be fact-checked before I move.

LOL. I think this is a mistake. See this link. I think the new dividend rate is $0.475, not $0.75. That's too bad. 

Natural Gas -- The Bakken -- And ONEOK -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46642ONEOK.

Link here. 

The statistics are absolutely incredible.

ONEOK: "GORs in the Williston Basin have risen by about 90% since 2016, while statewide flaring in North Dakota fell from 36% of gas production in 2014 to around 5% as of December, 2023.

$4.00 / $20 = 20%.

Never cut their dividend.

Thank Goodness -- With Nvidia, AMD, And Dell Investments I Needed This -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46641AAPL.

Link here.

Seriously I don't know what to make of this, but something tells me Apple, Inc. and Tim Cook are doing just fine.

You might want to read the article at the link.

Apple pays 4.5% the balance. No questions asked.

It's well worth the read.

The FDIC covers only $250,000, which begs the question. It speaks volumes about Apple, Inc. This is truly amazing.

Light Reading For The Evening -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46640REDBULL. 

Link here. 

This explains so much. I've always wondered about the background to these two stories.

From the linked article:

Dietrich Mateschitz never intended to build a Formula One world champion. Then again, he never intended to build a global energy-drink empire either.

He pulled off both unlikely feats because of the same basic impulse: He was bored.

As a marketing executive in his native Austria, Mateschitz traveled the world in the early 1980s hawking toothpaste, detergent and women’s cosmetics for a German company. He was stuck in a rut, fast approaching 40 and tired of life on the corporate treadmill. “All I could see was the same gray airplanes, the same gray suits, the same gray faces,” Mateschitz said.

Mateschitz was desperate for a way out of his monochrome nightmare. His escape route would eventually lead him into the Technicolor fantasy land of the world’s most popular motor racing series. What began with Mateschitz popularizing an energy drink called Red Bull in the 1980s, turned into a marketing revolution in the 1990s, and finally a disruptive Formula One team in the 2000s that would make the Red Bull name synonymous with F1 greatness.

Since the 1950s, Formula One has stood as the pinnacle of motor sports, a global series in which 20 of the world’s most sophisticated race cars now go wheel-to-wheel along winding tracks in glamorous locales from Monaco to Singapore. Its history was written by the likes of Ferrari, Mercedes and McLaren—companies that used the sport as a showcase for their engineering prowess.

But in barely two decades, a circuit dominated by those automotive giants and watched by more than 1.5 billion viewers per season was taken over by an outfit that had never before built a combustion engine.

ed Bull drivers have now won seven world championships, including the past three for Dutch wunderkind Max Verstappen. Their success has outlived Mateschitz, who died in 2022 at age 78. And as the 2024 season kicks off this weekend in Bahrain, the team shows no signs of slowing down. Amid an ongoing controversy, team principal Christian Horner was cleared on Wednesday by an internal investigation into inappropriate behavior toward a female employee.

Fresh off a steamrolling campaign last year, in which it won 21 of 22 races, Red Bull is now a prohibitive favorite to turn this season into another 200 mile-an-hour victory lap.

“How can a fizzy-drinks company take on the might of the constructors that existed in Formula One?” says Horner, who has overseen Red Bull’s F1 operations since the team’s first season in 2005. “It was about going in there and taking on the establishment, but doing it a different way.”

Much, much more at the link, but if you want to read the whole story, buy the book: 

Adapted from “The Formula: How Rogues, Geniuses, and Speed Freaks Reengineered F1 into the World’s Fastest-Growing Sport” by Joshua Robinson and Jonathan Clegg, to be published by Mariner Books, an imprint of Harper Collins on March 12, 2024. Copyright © 2024 by Joshua Robinson and Jonathan Clegg. Printed by arrangement with Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers (which, like The Wall Street Journal, is owned by News Corp).

Two New Permits But That Was All There Was Today -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46639B. 

Active rigs: 39.

WTI: $79.97. But either hit or trended toward $81 today.

Two new permits, #40558 and #40559:

• Operator: Hess
• Field: Wheelock (Williams)
• Comments:
• Hess has permits for a GO-Bergstrom well and a GO-Vinger well, NENE 28-156-98,
• both to be sited 480 FEL with one 326 FNL and the other 293 FNL

One dry hole:

• 33803, dry, XTO, Lund 44X-8G,

Week 9: February 26, 2024 -- March 3, 2024

Locator: 46640BIGSTORY. 

Top, top story

• IVF: hunch — 99% of those who pay big bucks for IVF are conservative, white, suburban, happily-married white couples. Trump knows.
  
• Alabama legislature jumps in; passes law to protect IVF providers after Alabama Supreme Court ruled otherwise.
  
• US economy on fire; 
• the US stock market continues to hit new highs;
  
• the Fed won't cut more than 50 basis points this year
  

Top story: 

• Ukraine on the ropes; Trump/Johnson throwing Ukraine under the bus, but interim spending bill passes; may include money for Ukraine
  

Top international non-energy story:

• Israel getting ready to clear Rafah of Hamas
• Biden says US will air-drop food into Gaza
  
• global shipping still avoids the Red Sea (Suez Canal)

Top international energy story:

• 
  

Top national non-energy story:

• Trump having trouble coming up with $400 million judgement; payable even if he appeals;
  

Top national energy story:

• 
  

Focus on fracking: link here.

Top North Dakota non-energy story:

Top North Dakota energy story:

• 
  

Geoff Simon's quick connects: link here.

Blogging Put On Pause -- Errands To Run -- Back Later This Afternoon Or Early Evening -- Gradually Filling In The Gaps -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46638B.

Friday night fugue! YouTube simply gets better and better. 

Andy Kindler, link here:

Come On, Eileen. Eurythmics In Rome.

EPA: link here. The adults are still in the room.

Dell: 

• surged 25% to hit a record high on Friday, following an upbeat annual forecast that indicated the tech equipment maker was also benefiting from the AI boom. -- Reuters.

Mexico politics: link here. Next Mexican president to be Jewish? Mexican presidential campaign puts America's to shame.

Dividends: Liz Sonders on dividends.

Dividends: link here.

Paramount: this might be my favorite link of the entire day -- "Presumably the Oracle of Omaha is pissed." 

• Yes, the headline writer for William D Cohan's article used that word. Why is Warren Buffett pissed? Presumably he let his minions talk him into buying Paramount. From Day One I wondered what that was all about. Like TSM, Buffett sold most / all of his Paramount as fast as he could. 

Plug Power: what a debacle. But at least it's solvent. Sort of. For at least 12 months. From the 10-K, something everyone should read who is considering investing in Plug Power:

Plug disclosed in the 10-K after the stock market closed Thursday that it believes “its working capital and cash position, together with its right to direct B. Riley to purchase shares directly from the Company under the ATM Agreement, will be sufficient to fund its ongoing operations for a period of at least 12 months.”

Apple:

• damned if you do, damned if you don't: A number of government agencies in the European Union and elsewhere have voiced concerns about security risks as Apple opens up its iPhones and iPads to rival app stores to comply with EU tech rules, Apple said on Friday. -- Reuters
• this is exactly why Apple argued against opening up the iPhone to third parties. We'll wait for comments over at MacRumors.
  

Apple: M3 MacBook refresh.

Apple: Apple movies.

Apple: the market went higher -- hit new records -- without Apple! 

• I always get a kick out of "Fast Money" talking as if they know what this is all about. LOL. Let's look at the crystal ball ... Apple ... 2043, twenty years from now? Wow, I wish I could write what I'm seeing but this is not an investment site. LOL. 

Apple: for all those investors irritated by Apple and AI -- they need to take a look at BRK (Warren Buffett) and Google. .

Twitter: for all the grief twitter gets, I find it amazing.

WTI: will we hit $81 today? After hours, WTI is up 3% today; up $2.35; and trading at $80.61.

Boeing: may buy back Spirit AeroSystems. The latter spikes: up $5 trading at $33.

Dune, Part 2: high on my list. May go to the last show tonight. Will have to wait and see.

Goolsbee On The Fed Rate -- Let's Continue To Beat This Dead Horse -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46637GOOLSBEE. 

Yes, let's continue to beat this dead horse -- when / if the Fed will cut rates? Meanwhile, while folks are  deciding whether to invest while waiting for the Fed to act, the "bulls keep running." -- CNBC.

The Nasdaq and the S&P close at another new high. 

The Dow? Within 1% of an all-time high.

Nvidia closes at a $2 trillion market valuation. Up 4% today. AMD? Up 5.25%.

Meanwhile, early this morning, CNBC's interview with "Goolsbee" was another incredible interview. 

Finally, someone gets it:

• supply chain; and,
• labor force participation and immigration

Breath of fresh air.

Bio.

Labor force participation.

Uterine Cancer Mortality -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46636OZEMPIC.

Link here. 

Easy to read:

A bit harder to read because it includes a graph, a lot of numbers, and "P" thing:

Then, there was a lot of discussion about reasons for this increased in uterine mortality.

But this is what folks will note:

So, what's an investor to do? Two words.

Lilly. Ozempic.

The problem: Medicare doesn't cover Ozempic yet for weight loss. 

But there's work-around: Medicare does cover Ozempic for type-2 diabetes. A much lower bar to meet.

But this is key. Minority women have highest risk and if Medicare doesn't cover Ozempic for obesity, one starts getting into racism.

So, it's just a matter of time. I think two years, possibly even as early as 2025.

Apparently WTI Hit $80 Briefly — March 1, 2024

Locator: 46635WTI.

*******************************
Lego Fanatics

The much-anticipated Lego Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs set will be released to the general public on Monday.

Investing, Apple -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46634INV. 

Before we get started: WTI is only 19 cents from $80. 

Now back to regular programming.

Yesterday at monthly meeting with broker. Broker, not financial advisor. Not RIA. Big distinctions. Whatever.

Most interesting bit of trivia.

Financial advisors recommend folks keep six months to maybe as far out, 18 months, of cash on hand for living expenses. 

Some very, very conservative financial advisors will even go out as far as three years of cash on hand for living expenses.

But crowd-sourcing at a major discount broker reveals upwards of 30% of their "investors" hold "decades 'worth" of cash on hand. That just blew me away. It was not clear whether this was a new phenomenon due to fact that MMFs were now paying 5% but regardless, I was blown away by that factoid. It's hard to remember that MMFs were paying 0.05% for twenty years (some hyperbole there, but one gets the point).

****************************
GDP Now 

Wow, a huge drop which was sort of expected after seeing the economic numbers yesterday: 2.1.

Was 3.0 yesterday, February 29, 2024.

Should be a concern for JPow.

*************************
Apple Struggling

No recommendation. I find it fascinating.

I keep coming back to this page.

Chips, semiconductor: link here.

• Home page for tech: link here.
• The cloud: link here.  
• Streaming: link here. Streaming wars.
• Spatial computing: link here.
• Generative AI: link here. 
• Apple Silicon: link here.
• Supercomputers: link here.

*********************************
Word For The Day: Translation
Second Meaning

Usually associated the Catholic church. 

Example: link here, the translation of the body of St Mark.

***********************
Æ

Updating The Squaw Creek -- Now Phaelens Butte -- Wells -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46633B. 

Personal investing: will buy NOG today, simply as a short-term trade; will hold less than six months; this is not an investment; it's a trade; no recommendation.

Tag: "Phaelens Butte" "Squaw Creek" "name change"

A reminder before we get started, link here:

The well:

• 20603, 416, WPX, Plenty Sweet Grass 18-19C, Phaelens Butte, t1/12; cum 427K 12/23; back in 2018, when the wells was six years old: can't find evidence of fracking data in 2018, but there was a lot of activity on this pad in 2018.
  

BAKKEN	4-2019	20	10966	10954	4161	22011	10444	10037
BAKKEN	3-2019	31	20510	20597	16182	41163	16888	21699
BAKKEN	2-2019	23	17990	18539	16952	37227	7549	27178
BAKKEN	1-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	12-2018	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	11-2018	30	153	0	0	307	0	291
BAKKEN	10-2018	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2018	16	596	451	196	1195	0	899
BAKKEN	8-2018	31	1089	1119	291	2185	0	1447
BAKKEN	7-2018	31	977	956	259	1961	454	770
BAKKEN	6-2018	19	618	463	344	1241	690	194
BAKKEN	5-2018	31	1313	1294	445	1880	1740	0

********************************
Others -- Note The 500K + Cumulative Oil
Most Still Show "F" -- No Pump

Link here. 

Is it time to take another look?

• 36820, drl/A-->F/A, WPX, Omaha Woman 24-13-12HC, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 82K over 28 days extrapolates to 88,198 bbls over 30 days; fracked 8/1/20 - 8/22/20; 8.9 million gallons of water; 84.5% water by mass; five wells on this pad; and look at that, no natural gas vented or flared; good for them; cum 497K 5/22; cum 509K 7/22; cum 553; still "F"; 572K 5/24;
• 36864, drl/A-->F/A, WPX, Omaha Woman 24-13-12HD, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 65K in 29 days; cum 305K 5/21; stimulated 8/20; 52 stages; 209K bbls water; 12.8 million lbs proppant; cum 426K 5/22; cum 438K 7/22; cum 491; still "F"; 500K 5/24;
  
• 37309, A/F, WPX, Omaha Woman 24-13-12HIL, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, first production, 9/20; t--; cum 351K 5/21; cum 579K 5/22; cum 596K 6/22; cum 716K; still "F"; 734K 5/24;
  
• 36819, A/AL, WPX, Omaha Woman 24-13-12HY, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 317K 5/21; cum 438K 5/22; cum 447K 7/22; cum 500K 12/23; 506K 5/24;
  
• 36821, A/F, WPX, Omaha Woman 24-13-12HZ, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 331K 5/21; cum 461K 5/22; cum 473K 7/22; cum 553K; still "F"; 570K 5/24;
  

The Nokota wells running in the opposite direction to the west of the Omaha Woman wells are similarly incredible wells. 

• 37133, A/AL, WPX, Nokota 24-13-12HA, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 294K 5/21; cum 412K 5/22; cum 422K 7/22; cum 483K 12/23; still "F"; 498K 5/24; AL; 
  
• 37134, A/AF, WPX, Nokota 24-13-12HB, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, first production, 10/20; t--; cum 390K 5/21; 69K over 13 days extrapolates to 160K over 30 days; cum 540K 5/22; cum 556K 7/22; cum 644K 12/23; still "F";
  
• 37328, A/AL, WPX, Nokota 24-13-12HQ, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 222K 5/21; cum 337K 5/22; cum 348K 7/22; cum 400K 12/23; 412K 5/24;
  
• 37135, A/F, WPX, Nokota 24-13-12HX, Phaelens Butte / Squaw Creek, t--; cum 303K 5/21; cum 443K 5/22; cum 457K 7/22; cum 524K 12/23; still "F"; 

TGIF -- And First Day Of Last Month Of First Quarter -- March 1, 2024

Locator: 46632B.

Tesla: stands to earn billions by opening US charging stations to Ford, Rivian. Ford offering adapters for free for some buyers.

Fisker: a "going concern." Link here.  Announced 4Q23 sales of about $200 million; Wall Street was looking for $330 million. Pre-market, Friday morning, down 40%. If it closed at 73 cents yesterday, could open at 45 cents Friday morning.

Daimler Truck: surges 13%to new record on bumper earnings; buyback announcement.

Snow, AVGO: link here. SNOW dropped almost 20% yesterday; could fall again today. Chart update:

Nvidia? Move over. AMD, MU in the news.

• AMD up 10% yesterday; looks to gain another 3% today.
• MU: up 1% yesterday; appears it may have another 1% gain today.

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.

Reminder: I am inappropriately exuberant about the US economy and the US market.

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

WTI: $79.45. Up 1.5%; up $1.19. Does it even matter any more?

Monday, March 4, 2024: 91 for the month; 150 for the quarter, 150 for the year
36282, conf, Enerplus, Warthog 149-93-31D-30H-TF,

Sunday, March 3, 2024: 90 for the month; 149 for the quarter, 149 for the year
40006, conf, Slawson, Thor 2-31-30H,
36280, conf, Enerplus, Meerkat 149-93-31D-30H,

Saturday, March 2, 2024: 88 for the month; 147 for the quarter, 147 for the year
None.

Friday, March 1, 2024: 88 for the month; 147 for the quarter, 147 for the year
40008, conf, Slawson, Thor 4-31-30H,
40007, conf, Slawson, Thor 3-31-30H,
39482, conf, Oasis, Ledahl 5402 42-33 3B,
38699, conf, CLR, Gibb 8-24HSL,
38639, conf, Hess, GO-Knudson-156-97-2017H-5
36278, conf, Enerplus, Fossa 149-93-31D-30H-LL

RBN Energy: how operational flow orders help the natural gas market stay in balance.

Natural gas prices remain at near-record lows, but with so much production being driven by still-favorable crude oil economics there’s a distinct possibility — especially given the warm winter we’re in — that gas inventories may test storage capacity this year, perhaps as early as Labor Day. Of course, there are many market factors that might prevent this outcome, including lower production, a scorching-hot summer, and gas-to-coal fuel switching. But it could happen. And whenever we approach the limitations of natural gas infrastructure, we’ve seen time and again the disruptions and dislocations the market must deal with. The most obvious market signals are prices. But when it comes to gas flows another important barometer is the use of operational flow orders (OFOs). In today’s blog, we update one of RBN’s Greatest Hits and take a deep dive into the world of OFOs and what they can reveal about the state of the gas market.