Locator: 48485MMFS.
My favorite chart. MMFs.
I remember not too long ago, the y-axis went to $6 trillion. Now? Trending toward $8 trillion.
*******************
The Movie Page
The most relevant movie one can watch periodically over the next three or four years, at least once a year, perhaps twice a year: Citizen Kane.
Locator: 48484B.
Venture Global LNG commences operations at Calcasieu Pass, link here:
US coal, link here:
Pronounced "H-twenty processors: H20, in this context, has nothing to do with water. LOL.
Trump relaxes restrictions; will let Nvidia export to China high-end chips especially made for China but it will result in a $5.5 billion charge to Nvidia. It seems folks forgot that Trump could have banned all chips made in America from being exported to China. My advice: Nvidia would be better off concentrating on chips for the US market. This is huge (and good news) for making America great. If this is "all about" China, imagine the technology gap that is widening between the US and Europe. Remember: just yesterday, it was announced two supercomputers to be built in Texas (Houston and Dallas, which will results in 100's of thousands of jobs).
Let's get a grip here, folks:
Getting more gassy, link here, but regular readers already knew that. It's actually good news:
***********************
Back to the Bakken
WTI: $61.33.
Active rigs: 32.
Six new permits, #41810 - #41816, inclusive:
Locator: 48483TOPSTORIES.
President Trump has been in office for only 84 days (or thereabouts)
Latest GDP 1Q25 estimate: - 2.4. GDPNow.******************************************
Top Stories
***************************
The First 100 Days
January 20, 2025 - April 30, 2025
Thirteenth Week Of President Trump's Presidency
**********************************
The Top Stories
TOP STORY: Pope Francis passes away peacefully (stroke), 7:30 a.m. local time, Vatican, Easter Monday, April 21, 2025.
Photo-op of the day: Margaritaville in El Salvador with US Democratic senator and a notorious MS-13 gang-banger. LOL. Sort of reminds me of Obama's beer summit (2009).
Biggest story of the week:
Top stories of the week:
Top international energy story:
Top national non-energy stories:
Top national energy story:
Focus on fracking: current link here. Generally updated late Sunday night.
Top North Dakota non-energy story:
Top North Dakota energy story:
Locator: 48482ARCHIVES.
For the archives. Definitely not ready for prime time. Intended audience: immediate and extended family members, no one else, except perhaps friends and colleagues and my Schwab broker. LOL.
Disclaimer: I am inappropriately enthusiastic about Schwab. That's me. I'm not recommending Schwab for anyone except for my immediate and extended family members. This note is for the archives for my immediate and extended family members and no one else. I am not disparaging any other financial institutions in the note below. I'm simply making the case that for my needs, Schwab is my choice. For others, there will be other solutions. I have no relationship with Schwab except as an investor / account holder.
For the archives.
I've had accounts and investments in numerous financial institutions over the last fifty years of my life:
So, what is that? Upwards of two dozen different financial institutions for various reasons.
Except perhaps for life / casualty insurance, everything I've ever done when it comes to financial matters could have been done with Schwab.
For the past several years I've been talking to extended family members about investing for financial independence (I don't like to call it investing for retirement).
My son-in-law, a US Navy submarine XO in a former life, a Harvard MBA, and CIO for a Fortune 500 company headquartered overseas, never considered Schwab as an option.
Our two older granddaughters had earned income for the first time in their lives and both are now 18 years old or older, allowing them to open their own financial accounts.
My son-in-law had to transfer 401(k) assets to another financial institution, and -- surprise, surprise -- he went to Schwab and after the fact told me how easy it was and how satisfied he has been with Schwab.
Our two older granddaughters and their Roth IRAs:
the younger granddaughter wanted to open a Vanguard Roth IRA; it became problematic and cumbersome due to a pre-existing "529" -- Vanguard rules -- so, surprise, surprise - she opened a Roth IRA at Schwab, and again, did that with no experience in such financial matters and asked no help from her father or me; she did it entirely on her own, electronically, on her own.
the older granddaughter wanted to open a Fidelity Roth IRA and it was even more problematic because it involved moving money from USAA to Fidelity and it was becoming, again, difficult and cumbersome. So, in one day, over the course of an hour or so, she opened a Roth IRA with Schwab and transferred the money without any difficulty. Again, she did this all on her own without help from her father or her sister who had opened the Schwab account a few weeks earlier.
The basic problem comes down to this: every financial institution has a history and a "reason for being," or their philosophy. Example:
My son-in-law, myself and both granddaughters "enrolled" in a "retirement investing" program which I've posted at another blog. It is on-going, the course is not yet complete.
But for investing for financial independence it comes down to this for me:
I've spent a lot of time sorting out pros and cons of Schwab, SoFi, and Robinhood. I've come to the conclusion that for me and for my extended family members Schwab is head and shoulders preferable to the others.
Three things Schwab has as "core competencies" and its philosophy:
**********************************
Disclaimer
Brief
Reminder
Briefly:
**************************
The Weber Page
From a reader.
From the discount bin at a local grocery store, a $10 rack of lamb on a Weber grill.
Locator: 48481SIR.
These are the industries the US needs to bring back to the US:
Honda’s goal is to ensure 90% of U.S. sales are with vehicles produced domestically.
The company is specifically looking at potentially moving production of its CR-V and Civic vehicles to the U.S. to support this goal, according to the report. Over the next couple of years, the carmaker is looking to increase U.S. production by 30% by adding more employees and shifts to its U.S. operations for its CR-V and Civic models, the report said.
Hyudai has also announced it will be investing $20 billion in the US.
*****************
Didn't Age Well
I've
never seen someone who hates America so much. And has so little faith
in the American economy. And to think she was once the Treasurer of the
US.
Trump relaxes restrictions; will let Nvidia export to China high-end chips especially made for China but it resulted in a $5.5 billion charge to Nvidia.
Locator: 48480SIR.
The business, political and general interest media is letting us down: no one is reporting -- in total -- all the stories of all the corporations with announcements of huge investments in the US over the next ten years. We're hearing a lot of stories on technology, LCD, AI, etc., there's a whole lot more going on elsewhere and we're hearing very little of all that.
These are the industries the US needs to bring back to the US:
Whatever happened to the Houthi security debacle less than a month ago?
Most amazing political story: Trump's opposition wants terrorists returned to the United States now that they've been captured and returned to their home countries. I honestly don't get it.
1Q25
Banks: link here.
ASML, link here, SIR:
Locator: 48479ELCAPITAN.
Before we get started: wiki's list of "transistor count" has not been updated in a long time.
Supercomputers to be followed at a new page. Page added April 15, 2025.
Back on July 13, 2023, we started tracking supercomputers. Link here. At that time, "Frontier" was the world's largest supercomputer according to wiki.
*****************
Didn't Age Well
I've never seen someone who hates America so much. And has so little faith in the American economy. And to think she was once the Treasurer of the US.
Nvidia: although it's still open to interpretation it sounds like one AI supercomputer will be built in Houston, and one will be built in Dallas. Nvidia says this will result in 100s of thousands of jobs. Wow. Link here.
More on supercomputers for the archives:
Original Page
Back on July 13, 2023, we started tracking supercomputers. Link here. At that time, "Frontier" was the world's largest supercomputer according to wiki.
The full "top 10" list has three new entrants.
The first non-US supercomputer on the list is #6, a Japanese supercomputer.
I assume classified computers in the DOD and US intel community could be on the top list.
Note the top three on the list above are associated with nuclear energy.Locator: 48478APPLE.
This is a first for Apple. First time ever ... strong demand .... the 16e did it .... $25 / month -- less than one dollar a day.
This just blows me away --
It must have "killed" MSN to have to report this story. LOL. Link here.
Apple: surprise of the day -- link here.
April 14 (Reuters) - Apple took the top spot for global smartphone sales in the first quarter on the back of the iPhone 16e's launch and strong demand in countries such as Japan and India. Apple had 19% of the smartphone market, despite flat or declining sales in the U.S., Europe and China, followed by Samsung opens new tab with 18% of the market.
Locator: 48477B.
Apple: surprise of the day -- link here.
The Masters: amazing --
*****************************************
Back to the Bakken
WTI: $61.29.
New wells:
RBN Energy: what is driving PADD 5's increased reliance on imported crude? Archived.
The West Coast energy market, PADD 5, is undergoing a profound transformation.
Consumption of petroleum-based refined products is declining due to a host of factors including increased renewable diesel (RD) usage, slowing population growth, electric vehicle (EV) penetration and fuel efficiency improvements, just to name a few, but that’s only half the story.
Further upping the stakes, crude oil production in the region has declined faster than downstream consumption, so it has had to increasingly rely on imported barrels to support its dwindling refinery throughput. In today’s RBN blog, we look at how the West Coast’s supply of refined products and crude oil has evolved over time and why its reliance on imports has grown.
In Part 1 of this series, we explained how the U.S. is divided into five Petroleum Administration for Defense Districts, or PADDs (see Figure 1 below). The East Coast’s population density makes it the largest consumer of refined products but, with no production to call its own, PADD 1 relies on imported crude oil to supply its shrinking refinery base. In Part 2, we put the spotlight on imports of Canadian crude oil and how critical they are to refineries in the Midwest and Great Plains. Most Canadian exports come through PADD 2 pipelines, and its 25 refineries (combined capacity of 4.3 MMb/d) are, in many cases, significant consumers of heavy and light crudes from the Great White North. In Part 3, we discussed the Gulf Coast — by far the biggest crude oil producing and refining market in the U.S. Its sheer size makes it critical in balancing crude oil and refined products markets, with its refineries being on average the most efficient in the world with ample export opportunities. Most recently, in Part 4, we addressed the importance of rising crude production from shale basins in and around the Rockies and how it has contributed to greater volumes being pushed toward the Cushing, OK, storage hub.
Figure 1. U.S. PADD Map. Source RBN
Today we finish off our series by focusing on PADD 5, which stretches from the island-studded waters of the Puget Sound to the sun-speckled glitz of Southern California and the deserts of Nevada and Arizona, with Alaska and Hawaii thrown in for good measure. The petroleum markets of PADD 5 are just as diverse as its geography, with plenty of refined product consumption to go around, although its 2.6 MMb/d of demand makes it the second-lowest consuming region in the U.S., way ahead of PADD 4 but behind PADDs 1, 2 and 3.
The majority of the region’s population resides in California, which was once the nation’s largest oil-producing state following the discovery of oil in the San Joaquin Valley and Los Angeles in the late 1800s. Since the Shale Revolution unlocked the resource potential of other states, California has been left behind in terms of its significance as a producer, primarily due to a hostile regulatory environment that discourages investment, particularly in the petroleum sector. At the same time, crude oil production in Alaska has started to show its age, with output in the state experiencing a steady decline. This trend in Alaska may be about to reverse, as we noted recently in Take It On The Run, but PADD 5 will continue to lag behind all of the other oil-producing regions.
