Locator: 48777TECH.
Locator: 48777AI.
If you are not following Beth, Evan, Shay, and a few others .... well, what can I say? I am convinced that there are folks afraid to get rich.
Moving at light speed, link here, exhibit A:
Locator: 48776AI.
Locator: 48776CHATBOT.
Locator: 48776CHATGPT.
Literally, overnight in some cases, "we've" got at least four or five new Fortune 500 companies.
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A Musical Interlude
Locator: 48775B.
President Trump has been president for six months: CBS is canceling ‘Late Show With Stephen Colbert’ after next season -- NY Times. Link here. Colbert: tone deaf. Or like the Air India pilot, a death wish.
Epstein: it's getting tedious and the US House is setting itself up to lose in the mid-terms.
Re-posting: I think I've posted this before. Can't remember.
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Back to the Bakken
WTI: $67.56.
Active rigs: 30.
Three new permits, #42134 - #42136, inclusive:
Six permits renewed:
Four producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:
Name change: seven XTO wells, #41824 - #41830, inclusive
Locator: 48774NEWSOME.
There is a reason why:
Before Biden, it was estimated that there were upwards of 20 million undocumented immigrants (all here technically, illegally) -- remember "the Dreamers" and the "Dream Act"?
Under Biden, some are suggesting, that another 12 million illegal aliens crossed the border illegally.
Those 32 - 35 million undocumented "Americans" are having an incredibly negative effect on the US economy in terms of shortages and inflation.
Trump will never get rid of those 35 million people.
It will take twenty years for US to "absorb" these folks. If it takes less than twenty years that will be amazing.
But it won't be twenty years of no change, and then all of a sudden, those twenty million are "absorbed."
The "absorption" will occur gradually over each year. And each year, things will get better, much better.
Assuming, things don't go back to the way they were before Trump was elected President.
Gavin Newsom:
Locator: 48773SIR.
The sixth industrial revolution is absolutely incredible (tag sixthindustrialrevolution, AI, SIRTRUMP). About six weeks ago, maybe three months ago, I forget, I get re-invigorated to study this SIR so that I could put a short summer course together for Sophia -- more on that later. [Note: SIRTRUMP has nothing to do with knighting the president; it's a tag for the sixth industrial revolution under Trump, or while Trump was president.]
But this is incredibly exciting. I will have to discuss some of this with an extended family member (or now, extended family members) who are better versed in this than I.
First of all, I am blown away by how good John Orton's 2004 book on semiconductors is. More on that later, perhaps. I update notes on this book at this blog. I guess that's all I will say about it for now.
The book that got me started in this go-around was The Lunar Men, and the book that got me started with The Lunar Men, was the H. W. Brands biography on Ben Franklin and a memoir by Christopher Benfey. I have notes on all these books over at my literature blog.
But first, a look at the market:
Then:
Others:
Most others I don't care about. Including AAPL.
None-tech in the news:
Uber partners with Lucid:
Cramer says stay away from LCID, RIVN
Other autos:
Of interest:
Energy:
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Disclaimer
Brief
Reminder
Briefly:
Boule: link here. [Rhymes with ghoul.]
A boule is a single-crystal ingot produced by synthetic means.A boule of silicon is the starting material for most of the integrated circuits used today. In the semiconductor industry synthetic boules can be made by a number of methods, such as the Bridgman technique and the Czochralski process, which result in a cylindrical rod of material.
Aluminum nitride (AlN) is being used in transistors, particularly in the field of power electronics.
It's being explored as a material for creating transistors with improved performance compared to traditional materials like silicon. Specifically, AlN's properties like high breakdown field and thermal conductivity make it suitable for high-power and high-temperature applications.
Here's a more detailed explanation: Ultra-Wide Bandgap (UWBG) Material:
AlN is classified as an ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor, a class of materials gaining attention for their potential to enable more efficient and high-performance power devices.
Advantages over Silicon: AlN offers several advantages over silicon in power electronics, including a higher breakdown field (allowing for higher voltage operation), higher thermal conductivity (improving heat dissipation), and the ability to operate at higher temperatures.
NTT's Demonstration: NTT Corporation demonstrated the first transistor operation using aluminum nitride in 2022.
Applications: AlN transistors are being explored for applications like electric vehicles and home electronics, where efficient power conversion and high-temperature operation are crucial.
Ongoing Research: While AlN transistors are still in the research and development phase, significant progress is being made in improving their performance and manufacturing processes.
Integration with GaN: AlN can be integrated with other wide-bandgap materials like gallium nitride (GaN), which is already used in some power devices, potentially leading to even more efficient devices.
Wow.
Is anyone on CNBC paying attention. This is a CNBC story but not mentioned on network.
Locator: 48770SUPREMECOURT.
From a NYT story earlier this morning, full article here:
The cases Adam writes about now are something else — emergency applications. These require a snap decision about whether a policy can go ahead or must wait while lower judges argue over its legality.
Critics call this the “shadow docket,” and the court usually rules on the urgent cases within weeks. Trump has won almost all 18 of these petitions. And unlike normal rulings, justices often don’t explain their rationale.
Some recent examples:
- On Monday, the court said Trump could dismantle the Education Department. The unsigned order was a single paragraph about procedural mechanics. Adam called it “an exercise of power, not reason.”
- In June, the court let the administration deport migrants to countries other than the ones they came from. Since the justices offered no rationale, the government had to ask for clarification about whether the ruling applied to men it had already sent to a U.S. base in Djibouti. (The answer was yes.)
- In May, the court allowed Trump to enforce a ban on transgender troops serving in the U.S. military. Its ruling was brief and unsigned.
Locator: 48769PGA.
Ryggs Johnston from Libby, MT, makes his debut in The [British] Open. Libby: far northwest corner of Montana. Population < 3,000.
It looks like DeChambeau will implode on/in the first round.
My hunch: USA isn't going to show the current hole on which DeChambeau is imploding.
I think he's on the fourth hole, par 4, his next stroke will be his fifth and he's far from the hole. Could he triple bogey this hole? Double bogey. Unless he turns this around quickly, he will miss the cut, but it's very, very early.
McIlroy is even, four behind in early play.
Phil Mickelson is actually playing here. Just imagine, Tiger Woods would have been playing had he not injured himself.
Here's DeChambeau again. Double bogey. After four holes, +2.
The Estonian:
After that double bogey, DeChambeau has remained at par, but is now tied with Jordan Spieth (and others) at 92nd.
I believe at the end of the first round DeChambeau is tied for last position with five other players. Or thereabouts.
Locator: 48768RATES.
Tag: best time to buy a house
We've had this discussion before.
From ChatGPT today:
From ChatGPT today:
My prompt to ChatGPT today, after reading the above:
How can you say "persistent inflation" when just a couple years ago, the inflation rate was 9%; inflation is now 2.6% or lower and at 2.6% it's right in the range of inflation for the US in the modern era (since 1950, let's say).
The reply from ChatGPT, after a long "reply," this was the bottom lie:
Not exactly sure how tariff rates are affecting housing prices. Just saying.
Locator: 48767TSM.
Who's sorry now?
TSM:
Locator: 48765CRAMER.
See disclaimer.
In addition, this is being done on the fly. My comments are interspersed with Jim Cramer's comments and it's very difficult to parse. This is not intended for anyone other than me. I recommend that folks not read this post. I'm doing it for my own edification.
I only watch Jim Cramer when the market is in bullish mood. When things are negative, I do not watch CNBC or Jim Cramer.
My "reading" of Cramer is often wrong. In fact, much of what I post as opinion / comments is wrong. That's fine.
He began:
He didn't even mention TSM in the opening.
Long opening on GE Aerospace. Posts 2Q25 beat. Cash flow doubling going forward?
Carl Q, in a non sequitur, brings up Air India 171 in passing. CNBC, like everyone else, is two weeks behind on this story. Cockpit voice recorder shows left-seat pilot calm as the jet was going down. The right-seat co-pilot was in a panic, yelling "mayday, mayday, mayday" as the plane was going down. I thought it ridiculous that Carl Q even brought this up, and Cramer pretty much shut down that conversation. It's a non-story for investors.
Just as firing Powell is a non-story.
Firing Powell. Brought up by Carl Q and Cramer quickly moved on with a lot of mumbo-jumbo -- in other words, he's not following this story.
Interview with Pepsi CEO. Sara Eisen did the interview. Sara very, very giddy on the results. CEO with staccato accent very calm, bland, and ho-hum. Pepsico is down 6% for the year. Down 15% for the full year. Okay. This is the kind of company Charlie Munger liked and Warren Buffett likes.
Pepsi has to react to RFK, Jr. CEO says he's ready to take on RFK, Jr, in many, many different ways. Will follow the consumer, and not RFK, Jr. Jim Cramer brought up the "sugar cane" issue. It's an issue because sugar has become very expensive. "Sugar cane" -- think US sugar, not imported sugar. But "cane sugar" vs "corn syrup"? I don't understand. My prompt to ChatGPT:
What's the difference between "cane sugar" and "corn syrup"? Why would President Trump ask cola companies to switch to "cane sugar"?
Bottom line, from ChatGPT:
From a nutritional standpoint, both cane sugar and HFCS are empty calories and metabolized similarly. Health experts say the difference is marginal, but public perception strongly favors cane sugar. It's an interesting answer from ChatGPT.
Jim Cramer on "cane sugar": the way to go, but it's not going to happen.
Commercial break at 8:28. Next: market opening.
Finally, TSM is mentioned just before the opening.
Bob Iger rings the bell from Disneyland, celebrating its 70th year. Wow, look at all the employees behind him.
Netflix. Earnings later. Price target raised significantly. Then Apple brought up in the conversation. Emmy nominations.
UNP????
BRK!!!!! Yet to shake out. Even more downside? Cramer seems very, very negative. Buffett is way too tax-concerned; Buffett waits too long to sell, but says if one buys BRK, one is buying a lot of good companies. Selling BofA???
Lucid, Rivian: absolutely, positively, investors do not want to be in these. Lucid is not the DeLorean, but it's close. Of all the things Cramer said this morning, he was most clear on this. Investors don't need to be in Rivian or Lucid. His wife owns a Rivian but he asks her, if Rivian needs servicing, where does she take it? Crickets.
MP is down 6% at the opening, but Carl Q and Cramer blow it off; due to public offering. Buying opportunity
Cramer is very, very upset with Abbott Labs (ABT). Cramer, not happy. Will have CEO on his show tonight. Very, very upset.
Health insurers: he thinks this sector is going to keep going down. Elevance Health (ELV) was the topic. It's all about cuts to Medicaid that come after the mid-terms. Cramer is amazed that no one seemed to have seen this coming.
Other subjects:
UK deal.
Dow has turned positive after economic numbers released this morning.
Locator: 48764POLITICS.
From The New York Times:
Locator: 48763SALES.
Retail sales: incredible numbers.
Jobs: definitely not tired. Numbers really, really good.
Import prices: again, incredible.
Export prices: again, incredible.
Initial jobless claims: 221K vs 233K estimated.
DJIA: down 100 points in pre-market. [Later: the Dow finished the day with a three-figure gain.]
No rate cut.
Locator: 48762MMFS.
Gartner hype "loop": link here.
Is anyoe paying attention?
Read this post first, the #1 post based on number of view pages (trending): link here.
Blow-up:
ChatGPT: this was my prompt today.
Assets in US money market funds hit a new high this past month, now trending toward $8 trillion when we were sitting at $5 trillion in 2020. The US equity markets are trading near all-time highs. Schwab says a lot of this is due to record margin trading. Where do you think all tis money is coming from?
Locator: 48761TSMC.
Special edition of the blog: link here.
US rail: talk of UNP / CSX merger. Investopedia.
Fed: everyone needs to hear the CNBC interview with the form Fed Gov Kevin Warsh. Incredible interview. You can tell when Becky Quick gets out of her depth.
TSM:
BRK-B:
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Back to the Bakken
WTI: $66.74.
New wells:
RBN Energy: new budget law boosts carbon sequestration, enhanced oil recovery.
The budget reconciliation bill signed into law July 4 by President Trump — known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) — dramatically scales back a number of clean-energy tax credits and adds a new layer of complexity for some projects, leading to a lot of doom and gloom around clean-energy initiatives, but the new legislation is a big positive for the carbon-capture industry. In today’s RBN blog, we look at how changes to the 45Q tax credit could help advance carbon-capture efforts while also providing a boost to producers of crude oil and blue hydrogen.
Let’s start with a quick refresher on carbon capture. When carbon dioxide (CO2) is captured and stored, and that’s all, the process is called carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) and requires a Class VI injection well for long-term storage in deep geologic formations. If the CO2 is used for some other process before it’s stored, it is called carbon capture, use and sequestration (CCUS) and for certain applications requires a much-easier-to-permit Class II injection well — the most common example being the type used in enhanced oil recovery, or EOR. Permitting for Class VI wells is typically handled by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), although a few states have gained control over that process, something referred to as primacy, and a handful of others, including Texas, are attempting to do the same.
As we discussed in our blog series on CO2 EOR, the technology has been around for over 50 years. There are more than 5,000 miles of CO2 pipeline in the U.S. owned by 29 companies — the leaders being ExxonMobil/Denbury, Occidental Petroleum (Oxy) and Kinder Morgan. More than half of those pipeline miles transport CO2 to EOR production and sequestration facilities in the heart of the Permian Basin. EOR is a well understood, proven technology, and also produces the crude oil with the lowest CO2 footprint.
To drive development in the carbon-capture industry, Congress created the 45Q tax credit. It was added to the federal tax code in the Energy Improvement and Extension Act of 2008, then expanded and extended under the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018. But the more generous tax credits didn’t spur a lot of activity, which is why improvements to the tax credit were included in 2022’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Credits jumped to $85 per metric ton (MT) for CCS and $60/MT for CCUS, up from $50/MT and $35/MT, respectively. Direct air capture (DAC), a far more expensive process, had been eligible for credits at the CCS and CCUS rates before the IRA. Its credit rates rose to $180/MT for CCS and $130/MT for CCUS. (Also note that all those enhanced credits under the IRA came with prevailing-wage and apprenticeship requirements.)
The 45Q tax credit has generally enjoyed bipartisan support since its creation, although the different rates for CCS and CCUS/EOR have always been a bone of contention. Supporters of evening out the rates have long argued that it shouldn’t matter how the CO2 is sequestered as long as it’s done securely, while skeptics of that approach have maintained that using carbon-capture technology to boost crude oil production is counterproductive and conflicts with wider decarbonization goals. A bill introduced in the Senate by a trio of Republican lawmakers in 2024 would have raised the CCUS/EOR rates to $85/MT (and to $180/MT using DAC), but it failed to advance.
Efforts to establish parity between the CCUS/EOR and CCS rates gained new momentum this spring as Republicans in Congress began constructing the legislation that would become the OBBBA. As part of an effort to reduce spending, fund a package of tax cuts and refocus U.S. energy priorities, the Trump administration and Congress quickly zeroed in on the IRA’s tax credits, including the Clean Hydrogen Production Tax Credit (45V), the Clean Energy Production Tax Credit (45Y) and the Clean Energy Investment Tax Credit (48E). But while the final legislation dramatically scaled back many of these tax credits, it was mostly positive for 45Q and the carbon-capture industry.
Figure 1. Revised Rates for the 45Q Tax Credit. Source: RBN
Locator: 48761TSMC.
TSM:
x: link here.
TSMC beats:
Like Air India, the CEO switched the "fuel flow switches" to "OFF." The Air India pilot left all that fueld in the wings, none of it went to the engines; BRK has switched off cash to their engines of growth; all that cash in the bank. It's truly frustrating. It's going to take BRK a long time to recover.
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Disclaimer
Brief
Reminder
Briefly:
