Abraxas, Samson Oil And Gas Provide An Operational Update

Abraxas Petroleum Corp. provides operational update; announces upcoming presentation:  

At Abraxas' Jourdanton prospect, in Atascosa County, Texas, the Blue Eyes 1H averaged 405 boepd (383 barrels of oil per day, 134 mcf of natural gas per day) over the well's first 30 full days of production. Total acreage at Jourdanton now consists of approximately 5,700 net acres. Abraxas also recently spud the Snake Eyes 1H, which is the first of four consecutive wells to be drilled on the Jourdanton prospect in 2014. Additional wells scheduled to be drilled in 2014 include the Spanish Eyes 1H, Eagle Eyes 1H and Ribeye 1H. Abraxas owns a 100% working interest across the Jourdanton prospect.

Williston Basin In McKenzie County, North Dakota, the company successfully drilled and cased the Jore 1H, 2H and 4H. The three Jore wells are now scheduled to be fraced in March, weather permitting. Raven Rig #1 recently mobilized to the Ravin West pad to drill four wells. Abraxas owns a working interest of approximately 76% and 51% in the Jore and Ravin West pads, respectively. 

We're going to see a lot of fracking activity in March, based on this note, and what else I've been seeing across the Bakken.

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

Samson Oil & Gas reports its weekly operational update: Co provides an update on its North Stockyard Project. (Update: Samson Oil sells interests in Rennerfeldt wells)

Rennerfeldt 2-13-H (SSN WI 25.03%)
The Rennerfeldt 2-13-HBK well was drilled to a measured depth of 11,572 feet, where the 7 inch production casing was set and cemented in the middle Bakken.

The forward plan is drill the 3,700 foot lateral to 15,230 feet (MD) and run the production liner.

Rennerfeldt 1-13-H (SSN WI 25.03%)
Rennerfeldt 1-13-H has been drilled to a measured depth of 11,571 feet, where the 7 inch production was set and cemented. The forward operation will be to drill the 3,600 foot lateral in the Middle Bakken once Frontier Rig 24 has completed drilling operations on the Rennerfeldt 2-13-H well.

Tooheys 4-15-14HBK (SSN WI 27.7%)
The Tooheys well is flowing restricted on a 22/64ths choke and has maintained an average oil rate of approximately 800 BOPD over the last 16 days.

Little Creature 3-15-14HBK (SSN WI 27.7%)
The Little Creature well is flowing restricted on a 18/64ths choke and has averaged 435 BOPD over the last 9 days.

Coopers 2-15-14HBK (SSN WI 27.7%)
The Coopers well is flowing on a 18/64ths choke and has averaged 490 BOPD over the last 5 days.

Coopers, Tooheys and Little Creature are located on the Tofte 2 pad on the northern boundary of Section 14

Blackdog 3-13-14H (SSN WI 25.03%)
The preparatory workover on the Blackdog well has been essentially completed, with the workover rig currently undergoing some repair work. The forward plan in this well is to perforate the first frac zone ahead of the arrival of the frac crew.

A coil tubing unit will then be used to drill out the frac plugs in both the Blackdog and Sail and Anchor 1-13-14HBK wells (SSN WI 25.03%), enabling both of these wells to be put into production. These wells are located on the Tofte 1 pad, which is on the southern boundary of Section 13 within the North Stockyard project.

Sail and Anchor 1-13-14HBK well (SSN WI 25.03%)
Sail and Anchor was fracked in September 2013 and has been flowed back previously, though that prior flow back is believed to have been restricted by the frac plugs. The plan is to have a coil tubing unit drill out the frac plugs on Sail and Anchor when fracture stimulation is completed on the Blackdog well.

Idle Rambling -- No Reason To Read This

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on anything you read here or think you may have read here. 

Three interesting data points ahead of Janet Yellen's first meeting:

• the stock market managed to eke out a slight gain today, and "eke out" is the operative phrase
• WTI futures were trading just above $100 until the close, when the price settled at $99.95
• there are 196 rigs actively drilling in North Dakota today

Whether the rigs are FlexRigs, conventional rigs, work-over rigs, or drilling salt water disposal rigs, they all represent work and tangible resources.

This $100-oil-streak is the longest sustained streak of "high price oil" -- ever. It's a lot easier to live with stability, even with high prices, than volatility, and at the end of the day, $100-oil seems about right. 

How did some of the NYSE companies do today? This is the one I'm most interested in today -- McDonald's. I thought I saw a headline that said sales were still slipping. Yes, here it is: "sales chilled by January weather." LOL. December was the unexpectedly cold month; January was pretty normal. Oasis, in the Bakken, said it was a normal winter -- I love it when a company doesn't offer excuses, but just gets on with their work. Apparently McDonald's competitors didn't have the same trouble with the weather. Yahoo!Finance is reporting:

In hopes of attracting more diners, McDonald's has been aggressively promoting its revamped Dollar Menu, which includes new burgers that cost more than a dollar. 

Hellloooo! Could that be one of the problems .... "revamping the Dollar Menu which includes new burgers that cost more than a dollar"? [No, I don't invest in McDonald's -- never have, never will; I grew up with McDonald's; always curious to see how they are doing; I have to agree that their menu is way to complicated. In 'N Out, by contrast, has two hamburger choices, one French Fry choice, and a drink, and that's it. Pretty simple.

Other news from the financial world:

The Wall Street Transcipt requires a subscription (which I don't have) but one can always glean something from the teaser, and this one paragraph says what many others are saying:

I think we are seeing two themes which will impact offshore spend in 2014. The first is a decision by some of the major IOCs to try and rein in capex in order to improve their free cash flow. The second shift seems to be that at least some of the major oil companies have shifted their capex focus more onshore than the offshore in order to take advantage of North American shale opportunities.

What is WBR&C doing? Bloomberg is reporting:

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. plans $5 billion in capital investment at BNSF Railway Co. this year, positioning the carrier to extend a lead in spending over its biggest rival.

The budget marks an increase of about 25 percent from the target set a year earlier, Fort Worth, Texas-based BNSF said yesterday in a statement. BNSF’s program includes $2.3 billion for its rail network and $1.6 billion for equipment, including locomotives and railcars.

Buffett’s railroad outspent Union Pacific Corp. (UNP), its direct competitor in the western U.S., by about $700 million in 2013, a gap that may widen. With a boost from hauling crude oil, cargo shipments at BNSF rose about 4.5 percent last year compared with a 0.3 percent decline for Union Pacific, according to estimates by Jason Seidl, a New York-based analyst with Cowen & Co.

That's an interesting bit of trivia -- BNSF is based in Fort Worth. We live in Tarrant County; Fort Worth is the county seat for Tarrant County. Tonight on the news according to my wife (I don't watch television except, rarely, for sports), according to new census figures, Tarrant County currently is #1 in the entire United States for the number of folks moving into the county (if that makes sense). The #1 county out of which folks are moving is Los Angeles County. Three families a day, according to the news, according to my wife, are moving into Tarrant County -- three families a day. Obviously they are not all coming from Los Angeles.

I can't help but think that Ft Worth-based BNSF isn't part of the big picture in US mobility. Maybe it's a stretch. I don't care. I'm enjoying Slim Dusty on iTunes in the background waiting for our older granddaughter to finish her swimming lessons.

By the way, back to the BNSF story above. I wrote the following on February 6, 2014:

I say all this because we have no idea what BNI would have done during this same time period, but one can probably use UNP as a proxy for BNI. My hunch is that with the demise of coal and a relatively bad economy, UNP has not done as well as BNI, since the latter pretty much has a monopoly on track in the Bakken.

Wow! Pretty good, huh. Compare that with the story above:

With a boost from hauling crude oil, cargo shipments at BNSF rose about 4.5 percent last year compared with a 0.3 percent decline for Union Pacific, according to estimates by Jason Seidl, a New York-based analyst with Cowen & Co.

With that, gotta go. Maybe later tonight.

Active Rigs In North Dakota Continue To Increase In Number; Nine (9) New Permits -- The Williston Basin, North Dakota, USA

Active rigs:

	2/10/2014	02/10/2013	02/10/2012	02/10/2011	02/10/2010
Active Rigs	196	185	203	165	91

Nine (9) new permits --

• Operators: Petro-Hunt (6), Whiting, QEP, Statoil
• Fields: Little Knife (Dunn), Clear Creek (McKenzie), Sanish (Mountrail), Grail (McKenzie), Buford (Williams)
• Comments:

Wells coming off the confidential list were reported earlier; see sidebar at the right.

There were two (2) well name changes:

• 19954, the BR CCU Olympian 21-2TFH will now target the Three Forks instead of the middle Bakken
• 27646, the HRC Fort Berthold 148-95-26A-35A-14H was incorrectly "placed" in T148N-R94W

Wells coming off the confidential list Tuesday:

• 25908, drl, BR, CCU Columbian 43-1MBH, Corral Creek, no production data,
• 25962, drl, BR, Archer 34-25TFH, Charlson, no production data,

Update On Keystone XL 2.0 North Pipeline Milestones

 Updates

January 29, 2015: House has already passed the bill. Senate passes the Keystone XL bill earlier today, 62 - 36. 

Original Post

About one year ago, I posted my best-guess estimates for the Presidential Keystone XL 2.0 North decision. The estimates (E) are brought forward below. I was wildly optimistic, expecting that the recently released State Department SEIS would have been released almost one year ago. Wow, was I wrong. I assume all the "snow-days" in Washington, DC, slowed things down for the State Department:

The old timeline

February 28, 2014 (E) White House approves with conditions. Any decision later than this will impact the mid-term elections.

January 30, 2014 (E): On President Obama's desk. 

January 15, 2014 (E): State Dept makes recommendation. Other departments can object. In early 2013, State Department said they would not make decision before end of 1H13, and then revised it by saying "not before March, 2013," so the January 15, 2014, date may be six months too long.

November 15, 2013 (E): Mandatory 30-day wait.

October 15, 2013 (E): State Dept publishes final SEIS in the Federal Register.

September 30, 2013 (E): State Dept compiles comments and answers any "substantitve" concerns.

June 30, 2013 (E): EPA places summary in Federal Register.

June 15, 2013 (E): 45-day comment period ends.

May 1, 2013 (E): EPA's mandatory 45-day comment period. Impacted by new EPA chief.

March 4, 2013: EPA has to review the draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS). No deadline to complete.

March 1, 2013: State Department's Keystone Pipeline report Friday. This was a draft statement.

The new timeline

I suggested the SEIS might be released by May 1, 2013, at which time the EPA would review the environmental study. In fact, that occurred, not on May 1, 2013, but on January 31, 2014. So, the new timeline:

• The EPA has 45 days to review the SEIS (E): March 15, 2014.
• State Dept has unlimited time to study the EPA concerns (E): reports September 15, 2014
• SecState signs off on final State Dept report, places it in Federal register (E): December 15, 2014
• President Obama makes remarks in State of the Union Address, 2015 (E): January 20, 2015

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

I updated the timeline today following The Dickinson Press op-ed on same. The managing editor's position: it's time for the President to make a decision. Okay.

Meanwhile,  here are the results of the poll at the sidebar in which was asked whether President Obama will eventually approve the Keystone XL 2.0 North pipeline:

• Yes: 31%
• No: 39%
• No longer matters: 30%

I won't take the poll down but I doubt I will update any new results.

Most Of ObamaCare Delayed Until 2016, The President's Last Year In Office; Tax On Medical Devices About All That Is Left

For newbies, there are three components of ObamaCare:

• the employer mandate (delayed until 2015; today, a further delay)
• the individual mandate (delayed for some; effectively delayed for all)
• taxes on medical devices (who cares)

Regular readers know that I opined that ObamaCare would unravel piece by piece. The employer mandate for large corporations was delayed until 2015. When the webpage rollout faltered, exemptions for individuals were announced. About the only thing left was the mandate for small business (part of the employer mandate/part of the individual mandate depending). No one really cares about taxes on medical devices except a few lobbyists and that portion of ObamaCare is still likely to be repealed or scaled back.

Today, the administration announced a significant portion of ObamaCare would be delayed. It's pretty much all over except for the political theater. Bloomberg is reporting:

Employers with fewer than 100 workers won’t have to provide health insurance until 2016 under Obamacare, as the administration said it would again delay a key requirement of the health law.

Larger firms have to cover at least 70 percent of the workforce starting next year, the Internal Revenue Service said in a rule issued today.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act envisioned as a cornerstone of its expansion of U.S. insurance coverage that employers with 50 or more workers would be required to provide health benefits to their employees. Under pressure from business groups, the Obama administration has weakened that requirement since July, first by delaying enforcement of the mandate until 2015. Many firms will have even more time under the regulation issued today.

2016 is a presidential election year. Anyone wanna bet the delay won't be extended until after the election? Rhetorical. Please don't reply.

Insurance premiums for 2015, to be announced October, 2014, will soar. If you thought they were bad now, you haven't seen anything yet. The insurance companies must be livid. As stated before, my hunch is the president will issue an executive order prior to November, 2014, that insurance premiums for 2015 cannot be raised more than five percent. There's a very good chance the executive order could even do a "Wal-Mart" -- require a rollback in premiums for 2015, promising the insurance companies that the government would make up the difference.