Bonnie Tyler dead at age 75.
Info tech stocks:
- more than 2/3rds of all stocks are down 20% from high.
- AVGO, QCOM, MU, TSM, AMD, GLW.
- SNDK. Currently 1,800. New: 2,000. This is a catch-up play.
Jobless claims in-line.
Ohio. CNBC's best state for business. Link here.
- At the top --
- Ohio -- #1
- North Carolina, #2; was first last year;
- Virginia, #3.
- Texas, #4.
- Minnesota, #5. Okay. Bogus story.
- Bottom five:
- #46: West Virginia.
- #47: Louisiana.
- #48. Rhode Island.
- #49.Alaska.
- #50. Hawaii.
Crack spread: at record highs. Trending toward $60. Valero. MPC.
- profit margin for refiners: 3:2:1 --> three barrels of oil for two barrels of gasoline and one barrel of diesel
- formula: [(2xprice of gasoline, bbls) + (price of diesel, bbls)] - 3xprice of oil, bbls] = crack spread.
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Back to the Bakken
WTI: $73.94.
New wells reporting:
- Friday, July 10, 2026: 15 for the month, 15 for the quarter, 368 for the year,
- None.
- Thursday, July 9, 2026: 15 for the month, 15 for the quarter, 368 for the year,
- 41917, conf, Murfin Drilling, MH Hecker 1-14H,
RBN Energy: spike in the D4 renewable identification number price about more than a higher mandate. Link here.
The price of the D4 Renewable Identification Number (RIN) has increased 130% so far in 2026. The jump in the price was a response to both a 70% increase in the minimum bio-based diesel volume mandate set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for 2026 and a higher price premium for soybean oil relative to ULSD (Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel). In today’s RBN blog, we analyze the additional factors at play in the increase, from both theoretical and practical standpoints.
Let’s start with a bit of background about how the mandates for renewable fuels work. As we noted in Something’s Gotta Give, the federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) requires certain minimum volumes of biofuels to be blended into fuel sold in the U.S. The required minimum, known as the Renewable Volume Obligation (RVO), is determined each year by the EPA. A RIN is the regulatory mechanism for tracking the production and blending of renewable fuels and also allows refiners and importers to prove they’ve met their RVO mandates.
To see the importance of the RIN system, let’s consider a bio-based diesel producer who buys used cooking oil — a common feedstock for bio-based diesel production — for $6/gal, processes it into bio-based diesel, then sells it for $3/gal to be blended with refined petroleum diesel for eventual sale as diesel fuel to truckers. With a $6/gal feedstock cost and $3/gal product value, the producer’s profit margin is negative $3/gal. Without a subsidy, production and sales would be zero. The RIN credit is the primary instrument that provides that subsidy.