Kuwait: First OPEC Nation To Call For Longer Oil Cuts -- March 13, 2017

OPEC is already in trouble with $49 oil. When the US raises interest rates, cost to borrow money for OPEC countries will rise (no link, easy to find).

Kuwait becomes first OPEC nation to call for longer oil cuts -- from Bloomberg.

By the way, see first comment: in February, 2017, Kuwait activated 7 more drilling rigs, going from 52 in January, 2017, to 59, in February, 2017. Something tells me OPEC is keeping a couple of set of books on oil production. The source: http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=79687&p=irol-rigcountsintl.

In fact, as long as we are at it, here are the number of active rigs Kuwait has/had according to BHI:

• February, 2017: 59 -- another huge jump again in rigs in February
• January, 2017: 52 -- note huge jump in rigs after November announcement
• December, 2016: 44
• November, 2016: 47 -- announcement -- OPEC cut
• October, 2016: 48
• September, 2016: 48
• August, 2016: 47
• March, 2016: 41
• February, 2016: 43
• January, 2016: 40 

*************************************
The Apple Page

Tech support in the computer sector, from Laptap Mag, via MacRumors: Apple is #1, by a large margin. Microsoft in fourth place; Dell in 6th place; Samsung in 9th of ten places. Look how long folks spent with HP to get their question answered or problem solved (almost half an hour vs six minutes for Apple; even Microsof was over 20 minutes to answer a question/solve a problem):

***********************

The Government Works In Mysterious Ways

I filed our 2015 federal taxes before the April 15th deadline (in 2016), on/about April 10th (I've forgotten the exact date; I could look it up, but not worth the effort).

I received a note from the IRS sometime during the month of August (2016) that I was due a refund (that's another story for another time) "assuming no new taxes were due."

Today, let's see, this is March 13, 2017, we received the refund from the IRS. With a bit of interest. 

Just in time to pay our 2016 income taxes.

From The US Govt File: Buy HIgh, Sell Low -- March 13, 2017

From The Oil & Gas Journal, data points with comments:

• seven companies awarded contracts for SPR oil
• 10 million bbls 
• 10 million bbls = one day's US production
• tells me how inconsequential the SPR has become (or maybe always was)
• seven companies, the usual suspects, including Marathon Petroleum, Phillips 66, Valero
• but also, PetroChina (so, the US sells oil at a very low price to enemy #1; LOL)
• deliveries to take place May and June (2017)
• one wonders how much the seven companies are more interested in "contango" than in supply?

Backwardation: immediate demand for oil, certainly we are not in that position now, which means we are in a contango situation, with the potential for huge gains by these seven companies.

*****************************

Pipelines, Pristine Waterways, and Native American Religious Rites

From Twitter:

Then There Were Four -- March 13, 2017

Updates

Later, 12:41 p.m. Central Time: a couple of hours after posting the original post below, The Drudge Report banner headline: US Navy simulates attack on NKorea.

Original Post 

Yesterday I added another region to the "on the brink" link at the sidebar at the right: NOKO-SOKO-Japan-China.

Today I see two new headlines over at Drudge:

• US deploys attack drones to South Korea
• Japan plans to send it largest warship to South China Sea 

*****************************

Expansion

I don't know how much folks are talking about this elsewhere and I've simply missed it. All these years I assumed the "Iron Curtain" came down in Germany because Reagan/Gorbachev made nice. That may have been 90% of it; it may have been 10% of it. Who knows/who knew? But at the end of the day,  one wonders whether it would have happened without the blessing of West Germany. It cost West Germany an incredible amount of money to absorb East Germany. But if one looks at this geopolitical event as a "corporate" merger or takeover, it made a lot of sense in the long run. West Germany, playing second fiddle to France and Great Britain had nowhere to expand.

Except in one direction. East. West Germany needed lebensraum and had nowhere to expand. The rest is history.

Take that analogy to current situation in South Korea. South Korea, even more than West Germany in the 1980s, is bursting at the seams. It cannot grow internally any more. Once you get past all the little, inconsequential countries, population density/square mile:

• Taiwan, 1,849
• UK, 650
• South Korea, 501
• Netherlands, 491
• Japan, 399
• Belgium, 343
• Israel, 319
• Germany, 235
• France, 100
• US, 84
• Russia, 22
• Canada, 3
• Australia, 2

The Market And Energy Page, T+52 -- March 13, 2017

Opening

Dow: down 40 points.

WTI: flat at $48.45

Ford to build SUVs in China.

Huge, huge story: Trump will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinpin at Mar-a-Lago. Camelot rising. This is a huge story on so many levels. Planned meeting over April 6 - 7. If I did the calculations correctly this will be days 66 - 67 of Trump's presidency. Not only in the first 100 days but incredibly early in his administration. President Obama did not meet with Xi (in the US) until well into his second administration; in fact, by September, 2015, Obama was pretty much a lame Peking duck. (Yes, Obama was the first president to visit China during his first term but the event was considered "rocky," and things had not improved by the time of his second visit in his second term -- The Washington Post). Trump will probably become the first president to have met all major world leaders face-to-face in his first 100 days of office, and well before his own party has confirmed all his cabinet appointees.

**********************************

Futures

Oil touches three-month low. Pre-market trading around $48.25; down slightly.

Futures: Dow was down slightly overnight, but about an hour before opening, up 12 points.

Best convenience store: first-ever ranking by GasBuddy.com.  Ranking based on cleanest restrooms, best coffee, best customer services, and, best overall. Kwik Trip was #1 in all except #2 in best coffee. Wawa rated to have best coffee. AAFES (Army & Air Force Exchange Service) ranked in top 5 in only one category: cleanest restrooms. Not surprising, for any number of reasons. I never recall seeing coffee, much less buying coffee, at an AAFES gas station. I don't recall ever receiving ANY customer service at an AAFES gas station. Often quite the opposite. I seldom felt welcomed at an AAFES station. Weird. But that was mostly overseas. I have visited AAFES stations (recently) in only a few locations (northwest of Boston, and in Ft Worth). The link also has highlighting users' choices in each state.

Bakken moose: human interest story at The Williston Herald. Second story in as many days about moose in Boomtown, USA. It's interesting that with the boom in human activity in the Bakken, the moose have also been arriving. Counterintuitive, but years ago we saw the same thing with wildlife and the Alaskan pipeline.

****************************

Not Smarter Than A Fifth Grader

This is Olivia's winning Bananagram board which "beat" her grandmother's board. Olivia is a fifth grader:

Blizzard To Hit Northeast -- March 13, 2017

Iso Express: over $150/MWH earlier this morning; now about $110.

Active rigs:

	3/13/2017	03/13/2016	03/13/2015	03/13/2014	03/13/2013
Active Rigs	45	32	112	191	186

RBN Energy: US crude oil prices, inventories, and the supply/demand balance.

The latest sharp drop in crude oil prices, which was blamed in part on unexpected gains in already record-high U.S. inventories, is a stark reminder of the importance of understanding and routinely calculating estimates of the oil supply/demand balance. Only by keeping up with the ever-changing relationship between crude availability and crude consumption—and by anticipating shifts in that relationship—can oil traders and others whose daily success or failure depends on crude pricing trends make informed decisions. Today we begin a blog series on the modeling of U.S. crude oil supply and demand, and the sourcing of input data.

Scott Adams: previously posted, could cognitive scientists eliminate ISIS?