Taco Tuesday -- March 18, 2025

Locator: 48523B. 

Stranded astronauts: splashdown scheduled for just before 6:00 p.m. EDT this evening, Tuesday, March 18, 2025. Should splash down off the coast of Florida at 4:57 p.m. CDT.

JFK: files to be released today? 

March Madness: begins tonight, with the "first four" play in. 

• this evening: two separate games, UNC/San Diego and Alabama/St Francis
• tomorrow evening: two separate games: Texas/Xavier and American/Mt St Mary's
• Thursday day/afternoon/evening/night: first round, sixteen games
• schedule here.

Google: acquires Wiz for $32 billion; links everywhere. Cybersecurity play. Incredibly bullish for sixth industrial revolution.

• deal was not completed under Biden administration due to anti-trust concerns ($30 billion at the time)
• completed under Trump administration within first 100 days
• this one acquisition exceeds entire dollar-amount of all previous Google acquisitions

Saudi Aramco: link here.

Chevron: Hess acquisition still moving forward, Chevron announces purchase of a bit of Hess (5% since start of year).

• Chevron putting on its game face;
• not all are getting a warm fuzzy on this deal.
• link here.

Globalstar: Apple, link here.

Dallas NASDAQ:

Inflation watch, Texas beer: $5.99.

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Back to the Bakken

WTI;

New wells:

• Wednesday, March 19, 2025: 50 for the month, 165 for the quarter, 165 for the year,
• 40032, conf, Hunt Oil, Oakland 154-89-31-29H 1,
• 39890, conf, Hunt Oil, Halliday 146-93-11-1H-1,
• 39889, conf, Hunt Oil, Halliday 146-93-12-36H 1,
• Tuesday, March 18, 2025: 47 for the month, 162 for the quarter, 162 for the year,
• 40482, conf, Silver Hill Energy Operating, Tucson W 158-94-26-35-1MBH,
• 40473, conf, Hess, GO-John-156-98-0508H-4,
• 40157, conf, Hess, EN-Schroeder-157-94-1102H-4,
• 40031, conf, Hunt Oil, Shell 153-89-6-8H 1,

RBN Energy: Gulf coast refiners to be tested by loss of Venezuelan crude oil. Archived.

The Trump administration announced on February 26 that it is ending Chevron’s permit to operate in oil-rich Venezuela, which will halt U.S. imports of Venezuelan crude by early April. These changes, combined with other recent developments, are likely to significantly impact complex U.S. Gulf Coast refiners relying on heavy crude. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll discuss these impacts — an issue our Refined Fuels Analytics (RFA) practice examined in its recently updated Future of Fuels report. 

First, some background. Chevron and its corporate predecessors have more than a 100-year history of operations in Venezuela. Chevron’s legacy company, Venezuelan Gulf Oil, began drilling in 1924, spurring commercial oil production there, and followed that up with operations at Lake Maracaibo and the Boscan Field (tiny, pink-shaded area in Figure 1 below) in northwestern Venezuela. Then-President Carlos Andrés Pérez nationalized Venezuela’s oil industry in 1976 and established Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) as the state-owned oil company, but despite the nationalization, Chevron remained, and it was asked to form joint ventures (JVs) with PDVSA. In 2006-07, then-President Hugo Chávez’s regime increased royalties and taxes on foreign oil companies and made other changes that prompted some companies — including ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips — to leave Venezuela.

Figure 1. Venezuela’s Orinoco Belt and Boscan Field. Source: RBN