The studies:
For all his talk about buybacks, it appears to be "all hat and no cattle":
On the CNBC crawler that caught my attention:
So, what's going on?
I was talking to an extended family member last night with regard to automobiles. His wife just bought a new car, and he's looking to buy a new pickup truck, but will probably have to wait until next year. He's quite "negative" when it comes to Big Auto -- he thinks they're all crooks -- LOL -- but that's neither here nor there. Actually I guess it's "there" because he doesn't live in Texas. But I digress.
I told him that I suspect that six months from now the "dam will break" and there will be such a huge supply of automobiles and trucks there will be no problem finding the truck he wants. I'm not convinced prices will come down all that much but the supply will be incredible. He doubted me, but I know I'm correct. The tea leaves have told me that. And that also means a lot of used cars will also end up on the market.
And late 2022, and going into 2023, we're going to see the same thing with EVs. No less than thirty-seven auto manufacturers will be bringing EVs to market and they've all said they will start to bring those cars to market NLT 2023. So, "NLT 2023" begins in 2022. Perhaps late 2022.
Our discussion then turned to the NFL.
What I did not mention in that telephone conversation last night was that all those cars coming to market will get there by rail.
That explains UNP.
Everything else sort of makes sense. Utilities being driven by inflation fears. Big Oil being driven by price of crude oil and OPEC's "inshallah" production policy announced today.
NASDAQ down 300 points; Dow up 300 points. Karma. Or as they say on CNBC, sector rotation.
Oh, back to UNP. One wonders if coal shipments to west coast to export to Asia might also be driving UNP. I don't know. Maybe I should do some due diligence, or as they tweet, I should DSDD.
On my way to DSDD I checked in on Berkshire Hathaway. BRK-B is up $7.21. Whoo-hoo.
Rambling:
Covid is knocking out a lot of folks. Airline operations have even come to a stop on occasion because note enough workers have shown up.
Question: how many folks directly involved with a commercial aircraft in mid-flight. Generally, NLT than six.
Question: how many engineers directly involved with a 110-car unit train mid-trip? Two.
The talking head on CNBC who I like most (not Jim Cramer), his top picks for 2022: pending. I may have missed his picks. Maybe tomorrow.
The talking head on CNBC who I like second most (not Jim Cramer), her top picks for 2022:
Final picks from Fast Money Halftime Report (the hour that is my third favorite on CNBC; midday), one each from four panelists:
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Interlude
One of the "things" that has really helped me over the years is visiting a fortune teller -- big in Louisiana and San Antonio, TX -- when faced with major life decisions.
The other day my wife and I were discussing estate planning. And, of course, you know what happened next. We went into downtown Dallas to visit Madame Whoo-Hoo.
She directed her crystal ball vision to my wife:
“You need to prepare yourself to become a widow. Your husband will be murdered in a manner most gruesome before the year is done.”My wife's response: “Will I be acquitted?”
Sticks to plan: will add 400,000 bopd in production in February, 2022. Inshallah.
WTI: up 1.5% on the announcement; up $1.16; trading at $77.24.
Germany: admits it needs natural gas during the transition. Link to Irina Slav.
Explosion: Greta's head.
Covid-19: the graph -- link here --
Santa Claus rally: last day today. SCR is defined as last five trading days of December and first two trading days of January. Dow surges: up almost 300 points in early trading, coming off huge day yesterday.
F: stock surges almost 7% after big gain yesterday. Announced today that it will start taking orders for the F-150 Lightning.
F: Ford beats out Tesla as top performing car stock of 2021. Link to Charles Kennedy.
Toyota: outsells GM in the United States for the first time ever.
Covid-19: 180° turn into 2022 is off the charts -- the effort by mainstream media and the Biden administration to change the narrative -- I started reporting this last week. Nice to see folks reading the blog. Abhi Rajendran saying the same thing: notes US setting an all-time "case-record" at over one million cases yesterday and US equity market seems not to care.
Anti-Vaxxer: dead of Covid-19. Will re-post elsewhere. Thread begins with tweet from Huffington Post. If I don't die of Covid-19 -- I'm in high risk group -- need to thank my wife. Sophia got her second of two vaccinations last night.
I-95: this started yesterday afternoon; continues through this morning, although the road might be clearing. Also here.
Global LNG: US sets record -- biggest exporter of LNG in December, 2021. Edged slightly above Qatar due largely to jump in exports from Sabine Pass and Freeport. I remember vividly one reader -- years ago -- telling me this would never happen.
Norway: another analyst saw what we reported yesterday on the blog. However, this analyst actually suggest what might be going on. Why didn't I think of that?
EU: sleepwalked into an energy crisis. Now at the mercy of Putin and the weather. Bloomberg pay wall. The latest? Germany is now reversing natural gas flow -- sending natural gas to Poland. Link here.
Savers: nice chart but interpretation wrong. Really wrong. This should be seen as really, really good news. Think Japan and last couple of decades.
Moving: annual 2021 United Van Lines National Movers Study, link here, will re-post later:
Fed: I'm loving it. Theme for the day on CNBC -- whether the Fed will really raise rates three times. Again, folks are reading the blog.
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Back to the Bakken
Active rigs:
| $77.47 | 1/4/2022 | 01/04/2021 | 01/04/2020 | 01/04/2019 | 01/04/2018 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Rigs | 32 | 13 | 55 | 63 | 54 |
Tuesday, January 4, 2022: :
RBN Energy: standards organization's base contract is central to winter storm Uri litigation.
In the aftermath of the massive Winter Storm Uri in February of last year and its impact on the natural gas industry, there has been a blizzard of civil and regulatory litigation. Whether it’s someone not providing contracted gas supply, not taking expensive must-take gas supply, or saying “not that contract, but this contract” where there was a big difference in pricing between the two, lawyers are having a field day with the meaning of two words: force majeure. To what extent was one party to an agreement protected from being in breach of contract because their deal said some things could be force majeure, or beyond their control? The purchase and sale of natural gas at issue in these contracts is overwhelmingly done through a standard base contract produced by the North American Energy Standards Board, or NAESB (pronounced “Nays-be,” not “Nazz-be”). In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the standard contract used for the vast majority of natural gas supply deals in the U.S. and how its provisions relate to the issues raised by last February’s Deep Freeze.