Locator: 50604B.
The $64,000 question: if push came to shove, how fast could South American / Latin American oil replace Middle East oil. My hunch: faster than most folks think.
SLB earnings out this morning: before the opening.
Wow, wow, wow. Peter Zeihan touched on it again today -- the challenge of America's light crude oil (shale).
Canceling the Keystone XL was the single biggest energy mistake made in recent history. Like in the past 100 years. That may be the real reason we're seeing high gasoline prices in the US. We have an excess of oil; unfortunately for our consumers and the refiners, it's the wrong kind of oil. That's a very simplistic but sometimes simple is good.
Jones Act: by the way, which type of oil was the first to be loaded upon announcement of the Jones Act wavier? Yup Bakken. This is the link if you need it.
Nscale's Monarch: CAT and BESS. Link here. This story simply gets bigger and bigger. CAT up 3.3% ($26 yesterday) and will hold that gain today. Do you know that a year ago one could have bought CAT at $300? Today? $835. And CAT pays a dividend. Comparing INTC vs CAT:
- one day: CAT
- five day: CAT
- one month: INTC
- six months: INTC but close
- one year: INTC but close
- five year: CAT by a landslide
- and, oh, did I mention, CAT pays a dividend? Albeit not much but that's probably due to the astronomic rise in share price.
Oil prices: $95 is the new baseline.
We've had three shocks to the system -- the OPEC embargo back in the 80s; Covid, 2020; and now the war. This time around, the numbers don't make sense and it seems analysts are more hopeful than realistic. Seriously, do you think we're back to $60 oil by summer? Airlines can't catch a break.
Iran: two huge developments --
- Trump's order to "shoot and kill" the fast boats; and,
- Kharg Island storage tanks should be full by the beginning of next week; if so, Iran will need to start shutting in its wells.
Intel's numbers: they don't add up. But the story/myth/hope is bigger than reality. Is there a possibility that Intel has become a meme stock?
Nvidia is scrambling. It's all about the CPU / GPU ratio and AMD is on the winning side right now.
MSFT: stumbling? Co-Pilot just the tip of the iceberg? But, wow, it's very, very difficult for MSFT to do this (cut jobs); absolutely did not want to do this. Not exactly a Hobson choice, I suppose, but that's what comes to mind. Others also trimming: META and Amazon. LDCs are costing them a bundle.
MSFT will cut employees by 7% -- first time in history that MSFT has cut employees? It's even a huge story in The New York Times. Link here. First time in its history? Yes, that's true: As of April 2026, Microsoft is taking a historic step in its 51-year history by offering voluntary retirement buyouts to U.S. employees for the first time. This move is aimed at restructuring the workforce, rather than a traditional involuntary layoff, and targets long-serving staff. Dead wood.
Insane: all of a sudden the energy crisis is all about Pakistan. Seriously?
For heaven's sake, it's a developing nation: as of early 2026, Pakistan’s economy ranks roughly 42nd–45th globally by nominal GDP (approx. $376 – 408 billion), placing it among developing nations. While its GDP per capita is quite low (around $1,600), ranking near 162nd, its large population supports a high PPP rank (23rd–27th). PPP: purchasing power parity.
Rail vs trucking: with investing, I learned during the Bakken revolution that at the end of the day, US transportation competition at the broadest level is "rail vs trucking."
The size of the transportation pie is pretty much stable; the slice of your piece of pie varies based on relative support for one or the other, rail or truck. Top discriminator? Price of diesel. Trains are so much more fuel efficient; trucks are so much more flexible, but incredibly expensive for the customer. This explains UNP's recent share price surge, I would suppose.
By the way, how is "stuff" being shipped to all these new LDC sites? I don't see a lot of heavy machinery moving cross country on trucks.
UNP at a 52-week high; who would have guessed. PEG on the high side, 2.5 to 3.5. Anything over 1.0 is "expensive" but I'm sure seeing a lot of great legacy companies, value companies, withe a PEG 2x to 3x that "1.0."
52-week high and look at that dividend: UNP will likely increase it's dividend in August, 2026, lifting it to $1.42. Could raise it as early as May, 2026. If it hits $1.42, that would be a 33% increase in its dividend since 2021. Has your salary increased by 33% in the past five years? In 1990, UNP paid 20 cents / share, or 7%. Just saying.
*******************************
Back to the Bakken
WTI: $97.77, going into the weekend. Pre-market.
New wells reporting:
- Saturday, April 25, 2026: 83 for the month, 83 for the quarter, 240 for the year,
42085, conf, XTO, GBU Hera 33X-7C,
- 41097, conf, Enerplus, Lind 145-97-2-11-6H,
- 41096, conf, Enerplus, Lind 145-97-2-11-5H,
- Friday, April 24, 2026: 80 for the month, 80 for the quarter, 237 for the year,
- 42184, conf, BR, Omlid 6-8-7 MBH,
- 41862, conf, Devon Energy, Finn 13-25F 4H,
- 41362, conf, Devon Enegy, Marvin 27-34 5H,
- 41361, conf, Devon Energy, Marvin 27-34 4H,
- 41095, conf, Enerplus, Lind 145-97-2-11-4H,
- 41094, conf, Enerplus, Lind 145-97-2-11-3H,
- 41093, conf, Enerplus, Lind 145-97-2-11-2H-WLL,
RBN Energy: propane exports to increase i 2026 as war with Iran shifts market dynamics. Link here.
These days, there are three main factors affecting the propane market: export economics, export dock space and storage levels. The war with Iran has dramatically shifted export economics and filled dock space, yet storage remains at all-time highs. In this two-part blog series, we will look closer at all three factors and provide our outlook for what’s in store for the remainder of 2026. In today’s RBN blog, we will review how we got here and discuss the upcoming changes in the supply/demand balance.
Propane inventories as of April 17 were 80 MMbbl — more than 23% higher than they have ever been this time of year. How did propane storage get so high? The math is simple. Figure 1 below illustrates the changes in both supply and demand. In 2025, total gas plant production (dark-blue bar segment at left) increased by 117 Mb/d, supply from refineries (orange segment) increased by 8 Mb/d and supply from imports (dark-green bar segment) increased by 7 Mb/d. At the same time, total domestic (non-export) demand (light-blue bar segment at right) increased by 46 Mb/d, with export demand (purple bar segment) rising by the same amount. This resulted in a total supply increase of 132 Mb/d and a total demand increase of 92 Mb/d. The balance is growth in storage of 40 Mb/d (light-green bar segment). That may not seem like a lot in a 2.7-MMb/d market, but multiply that figure by 365 days in the year and you end up with a 15-MMbbl storage surge.
Figure 1. U.S. Supply/Demand Changes for Propane, 2025. Source: EIA