Blowups Du Jour -- April 21, 2022

Link here.

Energy Round-Up -- April 21, 2022

Updates

Later, 8:44 p.m. CT: see India below. Now this from a reader: 

Cash-Strapped Pakistan Cuts Power to Households on Fuel Shortage - Pakistan is cutting electricity to households and industry as the cash-strapped country can no longer afford to buy coal or natural gas from overseas to fuel its power plants.

The South Asian nation is struggling to procure fuel from the spot market after prices of liquefied natural gas and coal surged to records last month as the war in Ukraine exacerbated supply shortfalls. Pakistan’s energy costs more than doubled to $15 billion in nine months ended February from a year earlier, and it isn’t able to spend more on additional shipments.

Original Post

The Biden Surge: tracked here. How is this going? Early report. Availability of oil was not the problem:

US oil: bbl of last resort. Link to Javier Blas.  

Polls: I believe I said something in the last day or so. Gasoline prices and presidential approval ratings are perfectly linked. Link to Charles Kennedy.

This activist "stuff" is beyond the pale: California state pension fund, CALPers wants to remove Warren Buffett as chairman of the board. Link here. 

Russia's economy is about to implode, watching a train wreck in slow motion:

• US banks set to write off $15 billion in Russian assets; link to Michael Kern;
• Exxon Mobil may completely withdraw from Russian by June 24, 2022;
• Shell in talks with Chinese firms to sell stake in Russian gas project.
• Biden bans Russian-linked ships from US ports; link here.

Others:

• Pemex: enough cash flow that Mexican government won't cover oil company's debt payments any moore; link here.
• India: coal supply shock causes major power outages. Link to Charles Kennedy.
• Saudi Arabia: growth outlook to surge; links everywhere, here's one;
• graph of the year?
• California: importing more gasoline ahead of driving season; link to Charles Kennedy.
  

OPEC+ exports continue to decline: link here.

• production issues,
• lack of proper maintenance,
• internal consumption increasing as power generation and cooling demand come into play
• we'll see much of the same in Russia due to loss of western capital, technology, and expertise;

Two New Permits; BR Renews Thirteen Permits -- April 21, 2022

Active rigs:

$103.80	4/21/2022	04/21/2021	04/21/2020	04/21/2019	04/21/2018
Active Rigs	37	16	30	63	59

Two new permits, #38888 - #38889, inclusive:

• Operator: Koda Resources
• Field: Fertile Valley (Divide Cuonty)
• Comments:
• Koda has permits for two Stout wells in NWNW 29-160-102;
•  to be sited 250 FNL and 480 FWL; and, 250 FNL and 510 FWL.

Thirteen permits renewed:

• BR: five Mazama permits; eeight Abercrombie permits, all in McKenzie County.

Nine permits canceled:

• Ovintiv (5): three Pittsburgh permits; one Kestrel permit; and, one Gariety permit, all in McKenzie County;
• Whiting (4): three Pronghorn State Federal permits, all in Billings County; and one Stenehjem Federal permit, McKenzie County.

One producing well (a DUC) reported as completed:

• 38611, 3,625, Grayson Mill, Jay 24-13F XE 1H, Banks, no production data,

Streaming Wars -- First Huge Casualty, It Won't Be The Last -- CNN+ -- April 21, 2022

Has it been less than a month? Amazingly, it's been less than two weeks.

CNN and CNN+ have a new boss. Effective April 11, 2022.

There was talk about major changes when CNN / CNN+ moved to Warner Bros Discovery, but I don't think anyone really thought CNN+ would be "let go." But there it is, in The New York Times. 

The shutdown is a stunning and ignominious end to an operation into which CNN had sunk tens of millions of dollars, from an aggressive nationwide marketing campaign to adding hundreds of new employees to hiring big, high-priced media stars, including the former “Fox News Sunday” anchor Chris Wallace and the former NPR co-host Audie Cornish.  

But the service’s fortunes changed abruptly after CNN’s former parent, WarnerMedia — owner of the prestige TV powerhouse HBO and the storied Warner Bros. film studio — completed its merger with Discovery, home to reality TV hits like “90 Day Fiancé” and the home-improvement gurus Chip and Joanna Gaines. Since the merger closed earlier this month, doubts have swirled over the future of CNN+, which was promoted to CNN employees and subscribers as the future of the network.

CNN had planned to spend more than $1 billion on CNN+ over four years, according to people familiar with the matter, budgeting for 500 additional employees, including producers, engineers and programmers, and renting out an additional floor of its offices in Midtown Manhattan to accommodate them. But the newly formed company has its own corporate priorities that could conflict with the big spending of CNN+. 

As part of its deal with former WarnerMedia owner AT&T, Discovery executives agreed to assume $55 billion in debt, which executives are now under pressure to repay. The company also said it would find $3 billion in savings between the two companies, which could result in belt tightening at some divisions.

This, of course, also raises the question about the future or "direction" of CNN without the plus. 

"Streaming Wars" are tracked here.

Streaming Wars -- Netflix -- Where Does It Go From Here? Bloomberg -- April 21, 2022

What's the most remarkable "thing" in the video below. It has nothing to do with the singer, her band, or any of the people listening. It's something else. Her father takes the video and does a 360-degree of the audience. These is / are something missing. Very interesting.

I thought of that -- noting what was missing -- when I was re-reading Bloomberg's newsletter on the Netflix debacle. 

This is such an incredible story, I will archive it so that it is not lost in the ethernet.

The lede:

For more than a year, Netflix has told anyone who would listen that there was nothing to worry about. Its subscriber growth was slowing, but the problem was temporary. It was just working through Covid weirdness.   

Yesterday, the company reversed itself and admitted its business is losing momentum. Netflix lost 200,000 customers in the first three months of the year. The company predicts it will lose another 2 million this quarter. Its stock dropped more than 35% today. Netflix, worth $308 billion in November, is now worth less than $100 billion.

You will read a lot of takes about what this means over the coming days and weeks. Many skeptics of the streaming business will use this moment to claim they were right all along. Netflix is doomed, as is anyone who blindly follows in its footsteps. Ignore them. Netflix defied expectations for a decade and gave every company in Hollywood good reason to try and mimic its success. It’s got 221 million customers, and generates about $30 billion in revenue. 

But this isn’t just a bad quarter. This is a watershed moment for the streaming service, which must now attempt its most difficult transition in years. Netflix has always been the upstart, challenging the established powers. That allowed it to move quickly and adapt. It anticipated the last two seismic changes to its business and got in front of the problem before anyone else knew what was happening. It sacrificed its DVD-by-mail business to embrace streaming and started making its own shows before rivals pulled all of theirs.

Now Netflix is the incumbent, the dominant and default streaming service. It must defend its position against rival services that can give customers the same experience as Netflix, often at a lower cost.

So where does Netflix go from here? (A lot of people have asked me this question, so we decided to do a special edition of the Screentime newsletter to cover it all.)

Oh, so what is missing in this story? The writer did not blame the problems that Netflix has on the Russian-Ukraine war.  Every other piece of bad news caused by the Biden administration is said to be due to Putin's War. Without Putin's war, there would be no inflation, gasoline would be dirt-cheap, and there would be no supply chain shortages.

As far as the video goes, you’re on your own.