In Today's Post:
- Holdings Watch
- Commodity Watch
- Stocks We Care About Today - GLBL, Dry Bulker comments, E&P Bubble Charts
- Odds & Ends
Holdings Watch: - The Wiki tab at upper left is updated. I will raise a little more cash today as my end of the month trip approaches.
- DUG - Sold the DUG $30 calls (DZGFD) for $0.70, down 42%.
Commodity Watch:
- Crude Oil closed up $0.36 at $136.74 yesterday in volatile trading with a $4 + plummet in the morning hours inspired by a dollar that finally looks to be breaking out (see chart below) being erased once word that the Nigerian oil union's talks with CVX are "not going well" renewing fears of a strike which could shut in 460,000 bopd. Part of the afternoon rally was also attributable to rising gasoline prices brought about by pictures of flood ruined corn crops in the midwest (July ethanol is spiking). Very volatile market. This morning oil is trading off a little over a buck.
- Dollar Watch: The dollar has been threatening a recovery for two months now and this could put some pressure on crude if the move has legs.
- Natural Gas closed $0.14 at $12.80 as a smaller than expected build in gas inventories helped drive the July contract to near record levels. EIA reported and injection of 80 Bcf into gas storage, 10 Bcf shy of Consensus and my own estimate for the week's change. A combination of warmer than normal weather (which increased cooling load), lower imports via LNG and now increasingly Canada and higher exports to Mexico are more than offsetting a 5 ish Bcfgpd YoY increase in lower 48 gas supplies. Link to last nights gas piece. This morning gas is trading off $0.10 to $0.15 with lower oil.
Stocks We Care About Today
Ubiquitous Decline Watch: Dry Bulk Update. The dry bulk names have been slipping since a pre earnings season peak in mid May where I opted not to participate in what was expected be another quarter of easy beats for the leaders. Much like 4Q it was a buy the promise and sell the actuals event.
With the Dry Bulk leaders down by a third in a little over a month I'm not looking to jump in now either. But the time may be approaching, especially for the less spot market leveraged names on the list. Here's a link to recent Capesize and Panamax rates, both of which surged early this year and are now retreating.
CHK Lawsuit Response. Yesterday morning ICC Energy alleged breach of contract regarding gas marketing from volumes produced at the DFW airport. CHK responded in the after hours with a "completely without merit" response statement. Says the allegations are inaccurate and misleading.
Where No Man Has Gone (Recently) Before Watch: OII won a $745 million contract to develop the next generation of spacesuits for NASA.
PBR ... Another Sub-Salt Discovery. A second well encountered light oil on Block BM-S-9 the same as the rumored to be massive (some say as much as 33 billion barrels) Carioca discovery. No production tests for now as (PBR) moves the rig to another well to try and avoid relinquishing lease blocks. PBR operates with a 45% WI, (REP) has 25%.
GW Rejects PDS Bid. Tells you what they think about the near term prospects for rig activity in the U.S.
E&P Multiple Update: In a nutshell, the large caps are trading low to historic forward multiples; the mids and smalls are a little more fully valued with multiples hinging far more on production growth and reserve life than their big cap brethren.
Key Takeaways:
1) I left the P/CF scale on the Big-cap chart intact from 2 months ago. Then we needed it to get some of the names , (EOG) in particular, on the page. But as prices have risen and analysts have almost reluctantly had their numbers dragged higher, multiples among the large cap segment have become compressed. On a forward basis, this is about as cheap as I recall seeing (EOG) and while (CHK) has delivered gains, it remain firmly grounded in cheapsville, despite having a 205 to high teens unit volume growth rate for at least the next 3 if not 5 years.
2) The small caps have have gotten more expensive which natural when you consider the greater leverage to their bottom line afforded by being able to grow more quickly off a smaller production base as they accelerate Shale developments. They also have not seen as much of an upgrade in terms of analyst revisions but I expect the next few weeks to change that as the Street begins marking numbers to market in earnest.
3) All of these multiples are on analyst prices decks which are $20 to $30 light to the crude strip for 2009 and $3 to $4 light for the gas strip. I'll expand the bubble list next week and also provide a back of the envelope view of sensitivity to energy prices.
Odds & Ends
Analyst Watch: B of A ups (PCZ) to buy, otherwise fairly quiet on the analyst front.
Addendum to Post for md:
CNBC reporting OPEC said to be considering a “sizable” increase in production from Saudi Arabia. They are saying 10 mm bopd which would be about a 500,000 bopd increase which actually isn’t that much as they used to be able to “flip a switch” on 1 mm bopd whenever they wanted. If they wanted to drive prices lower (and had the ability) they would drop a 1 mm bls on the market.
Meanwhile the OPEC continues to argue that the recent spike is due to a multitude of factors from a weak dollar to tensions with Iran and not a function of adequate supply.
OPEC also trimmed their forecast for global crude demand growth for 2008 by 60,000 bopd to 1.1 mm bopd which is still higher than IEA estimates for growth.
ZTRADE: Added SLB July $105 calls (SDBGA)for $3.10.
What in the world is going on with HK (down .75 already)?
Rexx-Cramer is an ______. Fill in the blank. Just because your headquarters is in College Station Pa, it does not mean you can pull off a Marcallus development project. Not just massive capital requierments, but deep and broad employee(technical infrastructure and exp) base. Success for Rexx is Goldman forcing a quick sale to a midcap who has proven them selves in a unconventional play.
Elwo re HK. Nothing from a fundamental standpoint. Scare hands leaving the name and probably cursing Cramer who had them buying at $37. I obviously think it turns soon.
Reef- agreed, would not have touched that valuation.
HK – looks as if you’re right. (Hope so, picked up some July 30s just before it turneback up).
Elwo – if they can get it into green territory and the group continues to act ok in down $2.50 I think it will put on a surge.
“From your lips…”
Elwo – I do what I can…
If you look at the HS plays, HK is not amongst the most expensive of the mid to small caps involved and it is one of the most diversified.
This past week was a quiet one in the shale, changes are someone talks about a well there prior to CHK’s conf call early August. I’m holding the September HK calls for that possibility and trading the more near months for a little more leverage.
z- bry on the move
Reef – so I see, group greening nicely although it has a ways to go on damage control from yesterday for me.
SLB topping $100.
HK green
PBR not really running on yet another sub-salt discovery. It’s a problem to have that you have so many prospects you can’t bother to test deepwater wells once they reach TD. Many analysts are putting paper to pencil on the name and the capex to develop these in approaching a half trillion dollars.
OII in space! Well, I didn’t realize I was investing in the space program, but happy to be there just the same 🙂
Reef, JR – just taking a look at the SONRIS site, scout ticket for Shreveport, a bunch of HS wells for CHK have gone off the list (out of testing) and are in the quiet period. Several for GDP too and GDP has a half dozen in various stages of progress at Bethany Longstreet.
Dman – yep, really not a stretch if you think about it. No air, very cold, leaks a non-starter. They’ve been working for NASA for years.
Z, relaize you do not follow EGY, however, they are currently doing a lifting [in excess of 650,000 Barrels] from their FPSO, and then immediately doing an upragde on the FPSO to increase water processing capacity, which will increase capacity of the FPSO. Additionally they have a new shallow water platform just a few day away from delivery at their Ebouri field[Gabon], with a shallow water rig on contract once they have the platform in place.
EGY’s offshore Gabon working interest is 28% [onshore Gabon it’s 100% in Mutumba] and they are about to launch a very aggressive drilling program [for them] both on-shore and offshore in Gabon plus a Farm-in on a Gas Well in the North Sea,[all of these in Q3/Q4] and and exploration in their Offshore shallow water Block 5 concession in Angola in Q1 2009. EGY has an interesting business model and no debt, with very strong ccashflow.
The drag on EGY share price has been reserves, which this drilling program should rectify.
Full disclosure, have been long EGY for 2.5 years, and follow it very closely.
Crysball – I keep a tenth of an eyeball on that one. Wrote this in May 2007:
(EGY) Snapshot:
* Interesting little E&P operating almost entirely in Gabon. Probably grows production 20+% this year based on recent new field hookup. They have just under a 30% interest in two fields
o (Etame- established with current production of 15-16,000 bopd gross and
o Avouma – just brought on line and ramping (6,000 bopd gross going to 10,000) on one block in Gabon and they operate.
* My favorite Swiss E&P, AXC has a slightly larger interest than EGY in the Etame field.
* Balance sheet looks good, lots of cash, little debt.
* The stock is cheap, trading at under 4x TEV/EBITDA.
* Reserve replacement has been negative which combined with 4Q down production probably is what has been pressuring the stock.
* Production comes via tieback to an FPSO so you have some lift-timing risk which may provide good entries if they are late lifting for a quarter.
* Next big growth doesn’t come until early 2008 (Ebouri discovery) but you may have some exploration catalyst off Gabon and Angola later this year.
* It’s interesting, I plan to do more work on it and will listen to their 1Q call this week (May 10).
* The company has a few wells along in Texas and in the GOM which I assume are legacy assets as there seems to be no plan for advancing activity in the states. I’d sell em but maybe they carry sentimental value or allow for some data access or some such.
Bird – just so you know, I’m a top down sector, bottom up stock guy and don’t do much playing of individual well results, I played IOC a couple of times to little gain and am not doing well with MMR / Blackbeard. But keep ’em coming!
Z Why is MMR dropping?
K – they are deepening the Blackbeard well to 35,000 feet. Fear is they still haven’t found what they’re looking for which is only good as a song title.
Z,
PQ is back into the red is there any reason for that with the others trading up?
PQ – no volume and I call down $0.08 flat, not down. Looking at the tick chart somebody wanted out but not in size and just hit bids on the way down.
Pete – volume doubled since I wrote 22, could be fishing, could be a broker comment although I see none and no news. Looks like noise to me.
thanks for the lesson
pete re PQ real reason is i bot some more yesterday and i have to be punished first!!!
The move on QBIK is getting a little nutty at this point.
as long as nutty is good!!!
K, me too
z – #18… can’t agree more…
So… Just to follow up on yesterday’s comments re: FTRS. They reported their long-awaited results from the GB-4 well. Suffice it to say, this pig is so ugly, they didn’t even bother to waste the lipstick. Company will turn their focus back to their Texas oil production.
NEXT!
Ky- I’m holding it for a spike on CHK or Haynesville well results. I think the pendulum will swing too far above anything deemed a fair valuation and this run has keep me out other than my opening position. If its already $4 when results come out this will have exhausted most of that pop potential and may downdraft rather quickly. TEV is still under $300 mm so I guess if CHK’s neighboring wells are big they might be able to justify a small premium but the doughnut holes of acreage QBIK has are not very large.
Group weakening as oil rallies and the broad market comes off. Damned if you do action.
Service names holding up nicely today.
DUG off and decidedly not a good way to hedge a drop in oil as really you are just shorting XOM there plus a few lessor, lower weighted names. USO would have been oil price shock protection, although again, not a good way to hedge against a drop in E&P.
Group trying to keep from sinking entirely back into the red. Not tempted to do much fishing just yet as the E&Ps seem to lack conviction and people may not want to be more long going into a weekend.
gdp moving up what is address for sonris site? thx t
Tex – Sonris lite at:
http://sonris-www.dnr.state.la.us/www_root/sonris_portal_1.htm
I’ve been taking a look at the wells in Caddo P. using the Shreveport scout ticket report at lower right hand side of the page.
GDP – got a mention from Art Hogan as Jefco’s favorite gassy name and I would just add that it trades at about 10x ’09 CF vs 8x for the HK.
GMXR, GDP, CHK, even QBIK, odd to see HK continuing to fail to join the party…it generally doesn’t resist the pull of the group for long.
Pete – still looking for something to explain the PQ dip, doubt I will find anything. I am thinking about adding more stock there.
thx for infor. how long is quiet period?
Not sure if it varies but I heard 90 days. Some of the CHK wells must be about to be publicly available in July or August (probably for May data)
Anybody see a broker note on GDP as it pushes to new record highs? tia.
Gas Storage Review –
EIA Electrical Power Monthly NG consumption Jan. 08 (527505) vs. 07 (441692) for Electrical and Ind. is running 2.8 Daily BCF higher. NG Monthly report Electrical Power Jan. 08 (444,478) vs. Jan .07 (441692). A discrepancy of 2.7 Daily BCF. This was due to NG Monthly report being estimated.
However NG Power plants are being built or utilised with a 20% Y.O.Y. increase in consumptionand it seems more is on the way. Hydro power is falling off a cliff due to droughts. Hybrid plug in’s will increase electrical demand and decrease gasoline demand.
This would seem very bullish for the Gassy’s. Perhaps LNG may be coming sooner than we think.
MD – I have recently heard the $15 number bandied about as enough to get LNG volumes up now but that’s just a guess. Europe was seeing new record prices as recently as 2 weeks ago.
On the Hydro, I have not seen melt levels this year but I though pac-nw got more snow this year than last. In the Tennessee valley there is certainly no drought. It’s really going to depend on nuke utilization and weather this summer and while I bet its going to be another record generation year I don’t think we see that magnitude of increase (or did I misunderstand the 20% reference?)
md: I think prices have to go to $15 or so for LNG to be lured away from the Far East. Europe is a bit easier and if they have an out of the ordinary winter, then we could see some weakness NEXT YEAR. But for a while the demand for LNG has pretty much starved the new US regas facilities. And many of the projects going in have firm committments to supply LNG to the Far East.
I think the increase in rigs drilling in L48 will help meet some of the increased demand but the other side of that coin is that companies are going to be hard pressed to find trained/experienced/non-drugged out workers to man all of these new rigs and engineers/geo’s to feed these beasts with locations to drill. We are severely short on people and trying to bump rigs by 10-20% at some point will be a problem. In the hot areas (NW Louisiana and Appalachia) we are seeing a lot of failed drug tests, even when they KNOW there will be a drug test!! Not random testing, just pre-employment! Rural America is besieged with meth labs! Is not just “Law & Order SVU” anymore! I was shocked when I heard this…suburb living for you!!
Z – you typed the $15 number at about the time I did. Great minds….
About the drug testing thing… the problem is rampant with operators and techs in Alberta oil sands as well which is adding to labour problems.
Steels and infrastructure names on fire today.
X, FLR….the need to build more liquefaction facilities is part of this.
Mark & V – ya know, NBR addressed the rig hand issue on their 1Q call and specifically said they saw no problem this year getting people. I thought it was brash at the time and now having seen the acceleration since then I wonder if they still say/believe that.
Could that be why WLT is up big today?
Ram – think WLT up with the coals which were down yesterday and now all green. Unreal how I keep missing that one.
Too many good names. I’m pesonally glad you focus on relatively few names.
HK resembles being pinned – but at an odd price.
Ram – Agreed, the whole group is just marking time today and drifting lower. Not a lot of news and we are in the summer lull with lots of folks on vacation prior to 2Q earnings.
Afternoon all. Oil triangle still in play. We could go as low as 132.50 but at some stage the break should be to the upside…
I failed to see why the market got so enthusiastic about the worst consumer sentiment figures in 28 years! But after the intitial push there was no follow through. This seems to be a typical move into options expiry but the indices continue to act weak imo.
Z, thinking of any quick trades today or next week?
Average consumer’s incomes are fixed while daily living expenses rise – almost daily. Sort of like third world inflation except our gov. says inflation is in check – so we’re o.k.
Ram – it seemed to be they read it as inflation is up but could have been up even more so we are all okay!
afternoon Nicky, thanks for dropping buy. Wonder if oil will pull off a late day rally and hammer the broad market into the Friday close.
Bossman – not liking the way things are acting from a “quick trade perspective” at the moment. HK is due a bounce but timing may be beyond next week. When I get more enthusiastic along those lines I’ll shout about it.
Bossman, unless we see a post NYMEX close rally in the stocks (energy group) I doubt I have another trade this week, making it my quietest week in terms of volumes of trades in many months. The phrase go away in May comes to mind. Directionless feel out there right now.
NG – The 20% I referred to was increase in NG consumption for electrical.
The note of interest was that this weeks EIA electrical monthly report of Jan.08 basically upped NG consumption by 2.7BCF daily over what was stated in NG monthly report for JAN 08. The balancing item of -155 could have been the electrical power discprancy.
So if January is an indication while supply is up 5 BCF in Lower 48 it is being absorbed partially by lower net imports of 2.3 BCF ( Canada should ramp up again) but also by higher consumption to electrical Power. And as mentioned in earlier discussions this bears watching. As long as CHK and others find new supply to keep up with demand LNG will not be a factor but my guess is that LNG’s are counting on the likes of electrical to outstrip supply.
md – do you mean a 20% YoY increase in natural gas for gas-fired generation?
Yes. Electrical Power Sector
Jan 07 441693 MMCF
Jan 08 527505 MMCF 19.5% increase
Total2007 vs. 2006 would have been 10%
MD – ok, gotcha, will have a look
Not to beat a dead horse, have July MMR 35, which are down 50 percent since I bought them. Trying to decide if I should fold or is there some noise out there yet to be heard? I do not have your patience!!
Irish – I’m holding August calls on MMR which may or may not have enough time for them to get well results out on the Blackbeard well that they are now deepening. I’m thinking about folding the position as there is a good chance the well will come up dry and the results to date don’t offer a lot of encouragement but I am willing to give the stock a little more time. I see no reason to add to the position at this time.
Please let me know if you come up with different numbers. Also look for discrepancy between EIA electrical and NG monthly data.
On another note I use TD Waterhouse.
The live screen for my watchlist is very limited and does not allow for options watch. Any recommendations for Canadian brokerages
MD, i was with TD waterhouse also, i hate how I have to refresh the screen, web based…I never checked out their active trading standalone platform though that they have
I switched to thinkorswim (both web based and standalone) and haven’t seen any cheaper commissions here in canada yet
US has so many more options that we can’t get here
Market looks like its busy watching the U.S. Open … like watching paint dry around here.
MD – will do over weekend. Now watching golf myself. I heard people say nice things about thinkorswim:
http://www.thinkorswim.com/tos/client/index.jsp
No end of day rally in crude apparent, Nigeria must be asleep. The last several weeks the pattern for the energy groups on days like today (red open, strong green, then back to red) is a general greening after the close of NYMEX.
You don’t have any news on NFX do you? I am figuring this to be stop running from New York, but still turns the stomach.
Re NFX – Terry Rather is selling 20K shares, leaves him with 147K, only news I see and that would not do account for the move.
Group may be trying to green as per 68.
MD – where did you get your Jan numbers, from the EIA’s elec power monthly?
Aubrey just reported another 200k shs of CHK purchased two days ago in the high 59’s
Thanks John 11…there is one thing I would add about looking as Aubrey’s purchases and also Tom Wards over at SD. These guys have massive Well Participation rights; Aubrey has had a working interest in every well the company drills going back 20 or so years and leaving out about a 1 year period I think in the 1990’s. As such, the program kicks him massive cash flow which he uses to buy the stock. Just so you know.
Eli, if you are lurking could you post the details on the program…I know you have them as you sent them to me awhile back.
Z, how do well participation rights work?
Thx Z..yes have known that about Aubrey for awhile but have always wondered why that isn’t more typical among other CEO types in the E&P area…any thoughts?
Z, Re: #73…I remember reading that in their 10K or something…Even though him and Tom are getting a buttload of cash for those wells, isn’t it a good thing that they keep buying company stock with that money instead of investing in another outlet? That’s something that always gave me a warm fuzzy when I had CHK…Didn’t matter what the stock was doing, Aubrey was always an acquirer…
MD – if you refer to the bottom of today’s post I put a chart and table outlining data from EIA’s natural gas monthly which goes through March 2008. I don’t see a big spike in demand for the electric power providers in January. There may be a definitional discrepancy from the Natural Gas Monthly to the Electric power monthly
Re the program, he has a right to participate as a working interest owner meaning they bill him for his 2.5% of each well and then he gets checks for revenue. If you ever do this be prepared to come out of pocket for things you’ve never heard of from time to time and also to learn about how fragile things like electrical submersible pumps apparently are. Anyway, he started I think at the beginning doing this as he founded CHK and he just kept plowing money back into the wells and then into the stock. I don’t recall him selling any stock.
Why don’t more CEO’s do this? I’m told it is more widespread than you’d think but he’s kind of the poster child for it.
Is it a good thing he keeps buying shares. Absolutely, its the ultimate putting money where mouth is play.
Is there anything wrong with it. Some argue that because he’s so wound up in it there is an inherent conflict of interest. My response would be that it has not hurt the stock so far.
Brian – agreed, he’s a rain or shine buy and I believe we will see him continue to buy shares when its triple digits. But the market nearly grain of salts his purchases now which to me makes little sense. He does buy other things including about half the real estate in Ok so its not like he doesn’t know there are other things to buy.
Does Floyd Wilson at HK follow Aubrey’s philosophy?
Ram – I don’t know. He just keeps saying the company is for sale to the highest bidder and he has the resume to make that happen.
wow QBIK
Done for the week. Have a great weekend all!
Group crawling back out of the whole into the close, nice moves in select names.
Beer Thirty!
Have a great fathers day! Look for the weekend post on Sunday as I’m out the door until then.
MD – let me know if that’s the same data source you were using on generation as you look over that chart added to the bottom of today’s post.
Don’t forget Aubrey’s small purchase in the NBA. I wonder if his % of the team gets him his own personal NBA referee for use whenever they need a “win”?
Based on the money he’s making, he’s probably topped the “half of OK real estate” figure by now. Probably has a mortgage on the Gov’s mansion! Which may work out well for him in a few years!! You never know!
Thanks for the posting
See email for links
The numbers you got were from NG monthly report and were estimates as Electrical report was being revised. My inkling is that NG side won;t change it till Annual report comes out. The true number for Jan. 08 is not 14.3 but 17. BCF which I believe is significant. The links for the electrical monthly is attached. The Feb. numbers might be out in two weeks so be prepared for more revisions.
The links are attached…. to the email
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7452524.stm