A Rambling Thought? April 23, 2026

Locator: 50603ARCHIVES.

If one is healthy, psychologically in a good place, and financially in a good place, when one turns 55 years old, one can look forward with pleasant anticipation, to living to be 75 years old. One can make plans; one can do the most possible to remain healthy. One has certain conversations with one's physician and one's significant others.

If one is healthy, psychologically in a good place, and financially in a good place, when one turns 65 years old, one can look forward with pleasant anticipation, to living to be 75 years old. One can make plans; one can do the most possible to remain healthy. One has certain conversations with one's physician and one's significant others. Those conversations are similar to the ones one had ten year earlier. 

But at 75 years of age it all changes.

If one is healthy, psychologically in a good place, and financially in a good place, when one turns 75 years, one cannot look forward with pleasant anticipation to living to be 85 years old (or can they?). Maybe one can look forward with pleasant anticipation to living to be 85 years of age, but regardless, those conversations one had at the age of 55 and 65 years of age, change at the age of 75. 

Insert your own ages for 55, 65, 75, and 85; situations are different. But for me, the ages 55, 65, 75, and 85 work. Those ages would have worked for both my parents. Interestingly enough, on the other hand, neither of my parents-in-law lived long enough to require the conversations to have changed. They were the lucky ones, it seemed, living life to the fullest until all of a sudden when they died. For the most part, they did not experience "getting old." I mean seriously old and no longer able to enjoy looking forward to their next birthday.  

Even if one is healthy, psychologically in a good place and financially in a good place when one has his / her annual physical exam at age 75, the conversation changes.

At 75 years of age for males, has one aged out of:

• colonoscopies?
• prostate exams, PSAs, high PSAs?
• chronic hypertension?
• high cholesterol; 
• watching one's weight for health reasons?
• skin exams for skin cancer?

I don't know. I haven't been 75 years of age before.  

But without question, I'm starting to address those questions with my grandchildren now. But slowly and covertly.  

A Rambling Thought -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50602ARCHIVES.

At some point, something has to give. 

How long can the "world" go with so much oil not getting out of the Mideast? 

Six weeks, so far.

Somehow, the world seems to be holding on. But this can't go on forever. Is it one more week, one more month, one more year. 

But at some point, something has to give. 

What if -- and this is what I think -- "Iran" can last a lot longer without "cash," than the world can last without Mideast oil. 

Someone better find a way to open the strait to Mideast oil. 
 

Urban Story For The Extended Family -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50601ARCHIVES.

Our twelve-year-old sixth grade student is incredibly mature and takes life as it comes.

She takes the bus to and from school.

Today, after school, she sent me a text asking if she could take Grammy and me out for "coffee" at her favorite coffee shop, The Black Sheep. This is not particularly out of the ordinary but it's been awhile since she specifically asked to take us out.

Of course, I immediately said "yes" and we went to The Black Sheep coffee shop where her grandmother was already enjoying a late-afternoon coffee with a friend. 

We asked our granddaughter how her day went; she said it was "a day." If you can believe it, she had three substitute teachers and one of the substitutes was a "pop-up" sub standing in for a long-term sub. The subs: biology, math, and reading. All of this one week before she has state achievement tests. LOL.

She mentioned in passing she also had a substitute bus driver for the morning route. Her regular bus driver is a psycho-path by all common definitions and so she was glad he was replaced today by a substitute bus driver. Having said that, apparently the substitute bus driver was even worse and she was very, very glad when he himself was replaced for the afternoon ride home. And that was it. 

Tonight we got home to findaa very serious note from the school district to let us know that during the day the entire school district -- some six schools or so -- were locked down and put in high alert.  

It turns out that somewhere in the city of Dallas, far from where we live and far from our school district, a large number of Dallas police squad cars descended on a private residence and took into custody a suspect involved in a domestic shooting. It was not clear whether a death was involved, but the suspect was in custody. 

So, the incident involved an individual, a domestic dispute far from where we live and far from our school district. Why was our school district put in high alert and locked down?

It turns out that the suspect was the driver of our granddaughter's bus -- the substitute bus driver that replaced her regular psychopathic bus driver. 

Our granddaughter was unaware of all that but she says that she was highly relieved when she got on the bus this afternoon bus it was not the substitute. 

We have no idea what the morning bus driver -- the guy that was picked up as a "suspect" in a domestic situation -- did that caused our grandmother so much alarm during the morning drive. I would love to know if he threatened the kids with a machete or a gun. LOL.  

Whether it was a machete or a gun, apparently it would not have mattered to our granddaughter. She takes life as it comes. LOL. At least when it comes to Dallas school bus drivers. 

 

One New Permit; Two Permits Renewed; Seven Permits Canceled -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50600B.

WTI: $97.11. Trending toward $100 again, on no specific news.

Active rigs: 23.

One new permit, #42859 --

• Operator: CLR,
• Field: Beaver Lodge, Williams County;
• Comments:
• CLR has a permit for a Langved well, SESW 2-155-95, 
• to be sited 420 FSL and 2587 FWL; 1920-acre spacing; bottom hole, NWNW 26-156-95.

Two permits renewed:

• Whiting: two Roggenbuck permits, Sanish, Mountrail County.

Seven permits canceled:

• Oasis: five Domalakes permits, Burke County; one Merganser permits Bottineau County; and, oe Owan permit, Williams County. 

INTC Surges -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50599INTEL.

Tag: INTC. 

1Q26: 

 

Updates 

April 25, 2026: Intel skeptic. Link here. 

April 25, 2026: Intel soars on signs that AI boom for CPUs is here. Reuters. Link here. Finally, the dots connect for Reuters. See below. My previous note.

April 24, 2026: The Intel story explains everything. But this is really, really cool. Was the Intel quarter a one-off? The question is whether to sell, buy, or hold now. Next question: is INTC a meme stock? 

April 24, 2026: APP ECONOMY: INTC, TSLA, and TSM. One is an outlier.

• TSMC: link here. 
• TSLA: link here. 
• INTC: link here. 

April 24, 2026: I've looked at many, many App Economy income charts and I've never seen one like the 1Q26 INTC chart. 

April 24, 2026: Shay could have said that many / most investors still think it's a bubble. Link here. They don't believe this is the fourth industrial revolution (the sixth, actually). Link here. The one to watch: AMD.

Original Post 

The Intel story today was an incredible story. It will be interesting to see how analysts interpret what this all means. 

AI query:

Intel surprised everyone. It appears that CPUs are becoming the chokepoint. The CPU / GPU ratio is getting back to "normal." Do you see it that way? 

Reply: 

Agree completely. Link here. 

Agree completely. Link here. 

Agree completely. Link here. 

Ticker: 

 

Link here.

Amazing that Pat Gelsinger couldn't do this.
 

This is pretty amazing:

**************************
Micron

Link here.  

WTI Spikes; Shares Of Majors Follow -- WTI Now Trading Above $96 -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50598JONESACT.

Tag: Jones Act Waiver 

The War: 

Giovanni Staunovo appears to be taking at face value analysts' reports that it is Trump's "truth social" tweets that are preventing any diplomatic breakthrough. It gets tedious. Link here. 

Apparently some folks prefer an Iran with nuclear weapons controlling the strait, and along with it, the entire Mideast, I suppose. 

The only tweeting in my feed today: Giovanni Staunovo. Wow. 

Everything being reported by Staunovo with regard to the Mideast suggests we might as well hunker down to a three-year Korean-War-like truce. Seriously. It will be interesting to see what the next administration will do. No president ever did end the "Korean War," and history, even if it doesn't repeat itself, does tend to rhyme. If we have a three-year Korean-War truce and the overall western economy GDP does just fine, it means one thing: Mideast fossil fuel is irrelevant after 2028. Seriously. 

By the way, speaking of which. Qatar has recovered! Qatar is now shipping natural gas despite the destruction of its export terminal in Qatar. If I can find it, I will post the link. Yup here it is -- see next section. Qatar's LNG export terminal is spelled "Sabine" and pronounced "suh-BEAN" or "suh-BEEN." 

Qatar:  

Oil traders are reading the blog. From oilprice:

I'm lovin' it. Anyone who thought we were close to a diplomatic breakthrough ...  

Back from biking, time for a bit of The Rockford Files.  

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Manhattan

Citadel appears to be backing away from a major expansion in downtown Manhattan. Link here. Why Citadel would plan to expand in the socialist capital of America is beyond me. Prior to the mayoral election: 

It's too soon to pivot to Dallas but that's obviously where they're looking. Perhaps, more specifically, Plano, TX.

Link here. 

If Ken Griffin goes ahead with his NYC plans, it tells me all I need to know about Ken Griffin.

New 52-weeks highs today: link here. Just some of them. And this was a huge down day for the market, at least during the noon hour.

Beth: AI? AI? It's all about memory. Link here.

Ethan BeWarned is worried about the fact that Qatar can no longer provide the helium that is needed to cool chip lithography. LOL. A doomscroller. Does the Permian produce any helium?

Doomscrollers: it's like playing whack-a-mole.

I have to quit. This could go on forever. 

Go Trump! Go Hegseth.  

For The Journal / For The Archives -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50597ARCHIVES.

This is for the extended family; nothing about the Bakken and not much about anything else. 

Not for the general readership. 

Family update:

Granddaughters:

• oldest granddaughter racking up the air miles between DFW and SEA, visiting significant other as often as possible.
• middle granddaughter having taken college courses in Peru and the Galapagos is now off to the Marshall Islands. Still has her eyes set on playing polo for the college team; the one and only time she has been on a horse was when she was in the Boston area in second grade. She also has 14+ hours flight time and two solo fights with the USAF -- from a couple of summers ago, California dessert. No interest in pursuing. Been there, done that. Favorite (?) college course: music, specifically German Techno; one three-hour class each week during which all they do is listen to music. 
• the youngest granddaughter is watching soccer and jiu-jitsu from the sidelines due to a "boot"on her right ankle/foot from a sprain that is slowly recovering. I don't think she needed it; she could have toughed it out, but she's loving the rest and the attention. 

Grandsons: six-year-old twins; home-schooled. just got their first-grade certificates in reading; now reading at second-grade level. Where they excel? Arithmetic and singing. One of the twins probably reads at third-grade level; the other prefers to discuss the history of Egypt, mummification, and purple dye from Murex snails. 

Wife: will not be happy if I write anything about her.

Me? First visit to a physician since 2018. I thought it was 2016, but it looks like it might have been 2018, eight years ago. I thought it was ten years ago. Although I couldn't pass the USAF requirements for the mile-and-a-half run, I passed the general physical -- so, if I'm called up, I'm ready to go. No meds, no follow-up labs, no nothing. Next visit: one year from now. If I remember, I will come back to this later. 

The US market has been on a tear, but today, a pullback led by Microsoft. 

BRK-B finally had a good day, but BRK-B is still way off it's historic highs. Huge disappointment for new investors, I would think. 

The Iran war is at (another) turning point. 

Hegseth has sacked the US Secretary of the Navy (well deserved; should never have been appointed in the first place; discussed at length elsewhere). Iran's leadership is incredibly divided: hard-liners who want to live the good life vs hard-liners who want to be martyrs. Trump appears to be perplexed. Nonetheless he is tightening his grip on the Persian Gulf / Strait of Hormuz and the blockade of Iran. Today he issues a "shoot-and-kill-on-sight" order -- for the US Navy to take out the "fast boats." The fast boats will go back into their shell(s) to come out to fight another day. 

AI/LDC: Nscale's West Virginia Monarch announcement is a game-changer. CAT, up as much as $31 earlier has pulled back as the overall market has pulled back. 

Investing: made major changes in portfolio. No new positions, but sold two huge disappointments and replaced with more shares of a particular US retail giant in which I already had a position. I live and breath investing and blogging. Seldom does one get these opportunities to make major changes in the portfolio. I don't think I have made such major changes in over a year. Again, did not add any new positions; simply added to existing positions, and completely eliminated one position. 

Best lunch deal: McDonald's -- double cheeseburger, small fries, and no limits on soda refills, $3.23 -- all in, with tax. 

The double cheeseburger is free today -- for the 2026 season, North Texas McDonald's offers a free McDouble (with an addition $2.00 minimum purchase) via the McDonald’s app when the Texas Rangers turn a double play at a home game. This "Double Play" offer is typically valid at participating DFW-area locations until 11:59 p.m. the day after a qualifying home game. At Starbucks, $3.23 will get me a tall coffee. The Texas Rangers double play - free double cheeseburger is this year's go-to luncheon for me.

Biking: ten-mile round-trip daily, except on the weekends; either for hash browns, coffee and real orange juice at McDonald's for breakfast or the "$3.00" McDonald's lunch. And I bet I weigh less a year from now than I do now.

Reading this week: really, really excited about Paul and The Jewish Annotated New Testament, NRSV, Second Edition, Oxford, c. 2010. Notes at this post plus elsewhere. 

***********************
The Book Page

The Jewish Annotated New Testament, NRSV, Second Edition, Oxford, c. 2010. Notes at this post plus elsewhere.

NScale's Monarch LDC In West Virginia -- Huge -- 8+ GW -- How Does It Compare To META's In Mississippi And Musk's In Memphis? How Big Is This? CAT Jumps $27 -- New 52-Week High -- April 23, 2026

AI query: It's a little confusing, but has it been announced who will install / manage BESS for Monarch LDC in West Virginia? Sources suggest Caterpillar (CAT) but CAT is not know for BESS, or are they? 

Reply:

********************************************
BESS

Power: from RBN Energy (behind a paywall): 

Power for Monarch’s first phase will be generated on site from gas, but not via turbines, as might be expected. Combined-cycle gas turbines (CCGT) involve much higher upfront costs, can be difficult to secure (see I Will Wait), and are not as flexible for variable loads compared with simple-cycle turbines or reciprocating engines. 

(Turbines could be added later in Monarch’s development.) 

Power for the microgrid will be generated by a fleet of Caterpillar G3516FR reciprocating engines, which feature rapid load-following capabilities (0%-100% in ~7 seconds, much quicker than a turbine, which typically needs several minutes to ramp). Caterpillar has agreed to provide the generator sets for the site’s first phase, which is expected to ramp to 2 GW by January 2028. 

Despite reciprocating engines having fast start times compared to turbines, they are still not fast enough for AI workloads, which may require thousands of electricity-intensive servers to commence operation nearly simultaneously. To address that issue, the Monarch site will incorporate one of the U.S.’s largest battery energy storage systems (BESS) into its operations. 

[It's hard to sort this out, but it sounds like CAT is also responsible for BESS.]

While Maine, North Dakota, perhaps Texas are cutting back on LDC approvals, West Virginia? "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead."

Disclaimer: in a long note like this there will be typographical and content errors. I often misread things. 

LDCs are tracked here. 

• Data Center Map, link here.

Locator: 50596CAT.
Locator: 50596LDC
Locator: 50596THEDRAGONSLAYER.

For me personally, this may be the biggest story of the year in the AI arena. Again, see the blog's disclaimer. This is for the extended family; this is not for general readership. 

Click on Disclaimer.

See also RBN Energy today at this post.

How big is it?

You can ask the question (I have) but nothing in the rest of the world (outside of the US) begins to remotely compare with Monarch.

Who or what is Nscale?

Ticker CAT: 

CAT:

• pre-market, futures: +$23
• at the open: +$27
• at noon, CT: up $31; broke through $840. One year ago it was $300!

How in the world does Buffett miss one like this? This is the one-year comparison, but the five-year and "max" show a very, very similar pattern.

Because of its business model, it is ulikely that BRK-B can turn this around very quickly. It has three issues which we have addressed previously. The only way BRK-B can turn this around quickly is dividends, and significant dividends and guidance on increasing dividends going forward, as long as they BRK is not investing in AI. And, to some extent, I would be concerned that BRK has missed the AI revolution.

St George's Day -- The Day The Brits Slew Musk And Meta -- Combined! Damn The Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead -- April 23, 2026

Locator: 50595B.

WTI: $93.48. StanChart: $95 is the new price equilibrium.

New wells reporting:

• 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,
• Thursday, April 23, 2026: 73 for the month, 73 for the quarter, 230 for the year, 
• 41388, conf, Hess, BW-Barbara Ann-LE-149-100-1705H-1, 
• 41793, conf, XTO, GBU Apollo Federal 14X-12D-N,

RBN Energy: Nscale's Monarch data center aims to optimize the BTU-to-GPU value chain. Link here. Archived. See this post to put this LDC in perspective. While Maine, North Dakota, perhaps Texas are cutting back on LCD approvals, West Virginia? "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead."

The rapid expansion of data centers and AI applications is one of the biggest stories in the energy sector and the Monarch Compute Campus, which is beginning to take shape in West Virginia, figures to be one of the most interesting sites coming online and could be a compelling test case for future development. In today’s RBN blog, we explore the Monarch project, a massive data center with on-site power generation that seeks to optimize the Btu-to-GPU value chain through upstream access to Appalachian natural gas, creation of the nation’s first state-certified microgrid, and a modular approach to development.

Let’s start with the basics. London-based Nscale, which builds, owns and operates data centers, announced March 16 that it had acquired American Intelligence & Power Corp. (AIP), which was established earlier this year by 8090 Industries and our friends at Fidelis New Energy. Since AIP owned the Monarch campus, Nscale’s acquisition included that site. Nscale also said the same day that it had signed a letter of intent to provide 1.35 gigawatts (GW) of compute capacity to Microsoft, setting up the campus as a flagship development of Nvidia’s next-generation Vera Rubin AI platform. We’ll touch on more details about the campus later, but construction is expected to start soon with operations beginning in H2 2027. Should the site expand as planned, it would reach 8.1 GW of capacity by 2031.

As we noted in Win, Lose or Draw, numerous factors go into deciding where to build a data center, and each location has its own strengths and weaknesses. While West Virginia has not seen a rapid buildout of data centers, especially compared to neighboring Virginia (home to at least 100 hyperscale facilities), the Monarch campus (see Figure 1 below) was especially attractive to Nscale primarily because of its size, scale and potential. 

Figure 1. The Monarch Compute Campus. Source: Nscale