Baltic Dry Index. 1204 +02 Brent Crude 50.47
Eurasian Snow cover. (How bad will
winter be?)
"It is always the best policy to speak the truth, unless of
course, you are an exceptionally good liar."
Jerome K. Jerome.
Yesterday, OPEC, the oil cartel of liars and cheats, gave American
frackers and Canadian tar sands a get out of jail card. OPEC says it agreed a
production cut among its members, while non-member Russia will also cut its
record production, maybe, “conditional on its
technical abilities.” But no one to cut before January. The short covering
rally began immediately. So now everyone begins guessing how long before one or
more of the liar’s cartel cheats. Since higher oil prices acts as a drag on
most of the world’s economies, how long before some of the G-20 start to go
under? No matter how Italy votes this weekend, is Italy now salvageable at all?
Below,
more on OPEC’s big day.
OPEC Confounds Skeptics, Agrees to First Oil Cuts in 8 Years
November 30, 2016 — 8:25 AM EST November 30, 2016 — 10:54 PM EST
The deal, designed to drain record
global oil inventories, overcame disagreements between the group’s three
largest producers -- Saudi Arabia, Iran and Iraq -- and ended a flirtation with
free markets that started in 2014. It was also broader than many had expected,
extending beyond OPEC. Most strikingly, Russia agreed to unprecedented cuts to
its own output.
The impact on the energy world was immediate: benchmark oil prices
gained as much as 10 percent in New York and the share prices of energy
companies around the globe jumped alongside the currencies of large exporters.
Whether that’s sustained will depend on how strictly members of the
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries stick to the agreement, something
they haven’t always done in the past.
“This should be a wake-up call for skeptics who have argued the death of
OPEC,” said Amrita Sen, chief oil analyst at Energy Aspects Ltd. “The group
wants to push inventories down.”
OPEC will reduce output by about 1.2 million barrels a day by January, the group said, fulfilling a plan sketched out in Algiers in September to cut its production to 32.5 million barrels. The agreement exempted Nigeria and Libya, but gave Iraq its first quotas since the 1990s. West Texas Intermediate crude futures rose 0.3 percent to $49.61 a barrel at 11:44 a.m. Singapore time after gaining 9.3 percent Wednesday, the biggest one-day gain since Feb. 12.
After weeks of often tense negotiations, the eventual alignment of OPEC’s biggest producers points to the increasing dominance of Iran among the group’s top ranks. It’s allowed to raise output to about 3.8 million barrels a day, a victory for a country that’s long sought special treatment as it recovers from sanctions. Saudi Arabia previously proposed that its regional rival limit output to 3.707 million barrels a day, delegates said.
Read more: Riyadh finds its power waning against a resurgent Iran and Iraq
The economics of the deal are “incredibly appealing,” Jeff Currie, global head of commodities research at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. The main aim of the cuts is “inventory normalization,” he said.
Across the U.S. shale path, the OPEC cut trigger a huge equity rally. Whiting Petroleum Corp. rose as much as 32 percent -- its biggest one-day jump in 13 years -- while Continental Resources Inc., the company founded by Donald Trump’s adviser Harold Hamm, gained as much as 25 percent, the most since 2008.
Saudi Arabia, which raised oil production to a record this year, will reduce output by 486,000 barrels a day to 10.058 million a day, an OPEC document shows. Iraq, OPEC’s second-largest producer, agreed to cut by 210,000 barrels a day from October levels. The country had previously pushed for special consideration, citing the urgency of its offensive against Islamic State.
The United Arab Emirates and Kuwait will reduce output by 139,000 barrels a day and 131,000 a day, respectively, the document shows. Non-member Russia, also pumping at a post-Soviet record, will cut by as much as 300,000 barrels a day “conditional on its technical abilities,” Energy Minister Alexander Novak said in Moscow.
“What was announced so far is bullish, but January is still far away,” said Giovanni Staunovo, an analyst at UBS Group AG. “December will still see ongoing record production, but market participants might ignore it. It does seem as though Russia will cut, which if implemented is also positive.”
More
Leaner and meaner: U.S. shale greater threat to OPEC after oil price war
NEW YORK/HOUSTON In a corner of the prolific Bakken shale play in North
Dakota, oil companies can now pump crude at a price almost as low as that
enjoyed by OPEC giants Iran and Iraq.
Until a few years ago it was unprofitable to produce oil from shale in
the United States. The steep slide in costs could encourage more U.S. shale
output if OPEC members cut supplies, undermining the producer group's ability
to boost prices. OPEC ministers meet Wednesday to weigh output cuts to end a
two-year glut that has pressured global oil prices.
In shale fields from Texas to North Dakota, production costs have
roughly halved since 2014, when Saudi Arabia signaled an output free-for-all in
an attempt to drive higher-cost shale producers out of the market.
Rather than killing the U.S. shale industry, the ensuing two-year price
war made shale a stronger rival, even in the current low-price environment.
In Dunn County, North Dakota, there are around 2,000 square miles where
the cost to produce Bakken shale is $15 a barrel and falling, according to Lynn
Helms, head of the state's Department of Mineral Resources.
"The success in Dunn County has been fantastic," said Ron
Ness, president of the North Dakota Petroleum Council.
Dunn County's cost is about the same as Iran's, and a little higher than
Iraq's. Dunn County produces about 200,000 barrels of oil a day, about a fifth
of daily production in the state.
It is North Dakota's sweet spot because it boasts the lowest costs in
the state, yet improved technology and drilling techniques have boosted
efficiency for the whole state and the entire U.S. oil industry.
The breakeven cost per barrel, on average, to produce Bakken shale at
the wellhead has fallen to $29.44 in 2016 from $59.03 in 2014, according to
consultancy Rystad Energy. It added that in terms of wellhead prices, Bakken is
the most competitive of major U.S. shale plays.
Wood Mackenzie said technology advances should further reduce breakeven
points.
Landlocked Bakken producers still need a substantially higher international
price than their breakeven cost to make a profit, since they pay more to
transport crude to market than producers in most other U.S. regions.
International oil prices of $45 a barrel are enough for some Bakken
producers to profit, Ness said, and $55 would encourage production growth.
More
In other news, China offers incoming President Trump an olive branch. So far so good, as the man falling from the Empire State building said, as he passed the 30th floor.
China says it wants smooth military ties with Trump
China said on Wednesday it wanted to develop smooth military-to-military
ties with the new U.S. administration of Donald Trump.
While the world's two largest economies are frequently at odds over
issues like the disputed South China Sea, both have been trying to improve
trust between their armed forces to reduce the risk of misunderstanding in any
encounters.
This month, China and the United States staged a three-day humanitarian
relief military drill as part of that trust-building exercise.
New concern looms with Trump's election as U.S. president. He lambasted
China on the campaign trail and has suggested Japan and South Korea be allowed
to develop nuclear weapons.
Asked about Trump's election, Chinese Defence Ministry spokesman Yang
Yujun said it went without saying there were tensions in the military relationship
and China hoped the United States would respect its core interests and
concerns.
"China is willing to work hard together with the defense department
of the next U.S. government to promote the healthy and stable development of
military-to-military relations," Yang told a monthly news briefing.
Finally, Cuba. What will the next few years bring? New brooms are coming
to Washington and Havana.
After Castro's death, attention turns to Cuba's heir apparent
With revolutionary leader Fidel Castro dead and his brother Raul vowing to step down as president in
15 months, it will soon be the hour of heir apparent Miguel Diaz-Canel, an
advocate for modernizing Cuba's state-run media and abysmal internet access.
Fidel Castro died last Friday aged 90 and the 85-year-old Raul Castro,
who took over as president in 2008, says he will step down in February 2018 at
the end of his second five-year term.
Diaz-Canel was elevated to the position of first vice-president in 2013,
putting him next in line for the presidency.
At 56, he is a relative youngster in the ruling Communist Party's
leadership and will need to appeal to younger generations if Cuban communism is
to thrive beyond the Castro brothers.
He has already established press and internet freedom as signature
concerns, a potentially disruptive change in a one-party state that has
monopolized the media for nearly 58 years.
Otherwise, however, he has a much weaker public profile than the Castros
and it is not clear what policy changes he would push through.
Until now, he has held to the party line or avoided public comment on
key issues such as economic and political reforms or relations with the United
States, which were overhauled by Raul Castro and U.S. President Barack Obama
over the past two years.
Still, experts say his position as heir apparent is solid and that he
would have to stumble badly for someone else to leapfrog him and become the
next president in Cuba's arcane system for choosing its leader.
Born after the Castros took power in 1959, Diaz-Canel is a child of
their revolution who rose through the Communist Party by cultivating relationships
within the political elite while avoiding the show-boating that ended the
careers of other pretenders.
"He has the advantage of having outlived his predecessors (as heir
apparent)," Christopher Sabatini, a Cuba expert at Columbia University's School
of International and Public Affairs, said on Monday.
Other apparent successors to the Castros have emerged over the years
only to fall suddenly.
Among them were Carlos Lage, then 57 and one of Cuba's secondary
vice-presidents, and Felipe Perez Roque, then 43 and foreign minister. They
were both sacked in 2009 as part of a purge by Raul Castro for appearing too
ambitious, unwittingly collaborating with Spanish intelligence agents and for
speaking ill of older leaders.
Diaz-Canel has been careful not to eclipse Raul Castro and is so
cautious as to come off as dull and gray, his public statements largely
unmemorable.
More
At the Comex silver depositories Wednesday final figures were: Registered 32.35 Moz, Eligible 146.59 Moz, Total 178.94 Moz.
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally
doubled over.
Below, when crony casino capitalism goes wrong,
friends fall out. Davos man turns miser.
"We
shouldn't pour cold water on everything.
We, the eight or nine players in global investment banking, have a very
good future."
Deutsche
Bank, CEO Josef Ackermann. Davos, January 2007.
Merkel Coalition Targets Deutsche Bank’s Ex-CEO in Bonus Feud
Birgit Jennen November 30, 2016 — 5:39 AM EST German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition is taking aim at former Deutsche Bank AG Chief Executive Officer Josef Ackermann in a dispute over bonuses, distancing her government from the bank’s legacy in an election year.As the country’s biggest bank faces a U.S. government probe tied to residential mortgage-backed securities, the criticism in Berlin is a sign of encouragement for changes at Deutsche Bank being pursued by CEO John Cryan, including job cuts and a shift toward core banking tasks. German policy makers associate the old business model and its perceived excesses with Ackermann, 68, who stepped down in 2012 and this month questioned whether executives should forfeit bonuses.
“It isn’t a happy situation when someone causes damage to a bank and then wants to be rewarded on top of that,” Ralph Brinkhaus, a deputy caucus head of Merkel’s Christian Democrat-led bloc in parliament, said in an interview. Bonuses “are performance-based compensation” and “should be clawed back if someone performed badly,” said Carsten Schneider, a finance lawmaker for the Social Democrats, Merkel’s junior coalition partner.
Ackermann’s comments ignited a spat with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, who was quoted by German newswire Deutsche Presse-Agentur as criticizing executives who are reluctant to forgo bonuses. When that prompted a rebuke by Ackermann for turning the matter into a public dispute, Schaeuble responded he could “live with” it.
As Merkel seeks a fourth term in next year’s German election, her government’s history of clashes with Deutsche Bank during her and Schaeuble’s 11 years in power still resonates. Government officials have said that Germany would welcome a smaller Deutsche Bank as a way to reduce the lender’s capital requirements amid misconduct fines and stricter capital rules.
“The government wants to show that it isn’t on board with Ackermann’s
business model,” said Hans-Peter Burghof, professor of finance at Hohenheim
University near Stuttgart. “Schaeuble’s criticism signals that the German
government is keeping its distance from the Ackermann era.”
Ackermann, who was CEO between 2002 and 2012, helped build Deutsche Bank
into a global investment bank, steering the company through the 2008 credit
crunch and Europe’s subsequent sovereign-debt crisis without taking direct
state aid.
In his comments to a conference in Berlin, he said it would be hard to
forfeit bonuses because it would place the bank’s more junior executives at a
disadvantage.
More
“It is hard for us, without being flippant, to even
see a scenario within any kind of realm of reason that would see us losing one
dollar in any of those [CDS] transactions.”
Joseph J. Cassano, a former A.I.G. executive,
August 2007, on Credit Default Swaps that wiped out A.I.G in 2008.
Solar & Related Update.
With events
happening fast in the development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported. Is converting sunlight to usable cheap
AC or DC energy mankind’s future from the 21st century onwards? DC?
A quantum computer next?
Graphene technology enables fully flexible NFC antennas
Date: November 29, 2016
Source: Graphene Flagship
Summary: Graphene is currently one of the most extensively studied
materials in the world, both on a scientific and industrial level. The world’s
first two-dimensional material, this single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a
hexagonal lattice has a series of unique and outstanding properties. As well as
being the thinnest, strongest and lightest known material, graphene is
flexible, impermeable and extremely electrically and thermally conductive. All
properties well suited for next generation NFC antennas.
Graphene is currently one of the most extensively studied materials in
the world, both on a scientific and industrial level. The world's first
two-dimensional material, this single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a
hexagonal lattice has a series of unique and outstanding properties. As well as
being the thinnest, strongest and lightest known material, graphene is
flexible, impermeable and extremely electrically and thermally conductive. All
properties well suited for next generation NFC antennas.
Near-field communication (NFC) is a set of communication protocols that
enables two electronic devices to transfer data. The most distinctive
characteristic of NFC is the fact that it can transmit small amounts of data
wireless only within a close range while other methods, such as Bluetooth and
Wi-Fi, have a wide transmit range of up to 10 or even 100m. The reason why NFC
technology is used to identify objects is that, with such a close transmitting
range, it is more secure and less vulnerable to data hijacking. Application
areas are tracking and managing inventories, assets, people, animals,
contactless payment systems, security cards and social networking.
The Graphene Flagship Italian partner CNR-ISOF's research shows that it
is possible to use graphene to produce fully flexible NFC antennas. By
combining material characterization, computer modelling and engineering of the
device, the Graphene Flagship researchers designed an antenna that could
exchange information with near-field communication devices such as a mobile
phone, matching the performance of conventional metallic antennas. The
graphene-based NFC antennas are chemically inert, highly resistant to thousands
of bending cycles and can be deposited on different standard polymeric
substrates or silk tissues.
Vincenzo Palermo, Graphene Flagship leader of the Polymer Composites
research area and group leader of the Nano-Chemistry laboratory in the
Institute for Organic Synthesis and Photoreactivity of National Research
Council (CNR) says: "A key target for modern technology is to replace
metals with lighter, cheaper, less energy-consuming and better recyclable
materials. Due to its unique combination of superior properties, graphene can
be used to produce fully flexible NFC antennas."
"The possibility to produce fully flexible graphene based NFC
antennas showcases future applications such as wearable NFC tags interacting
with smartphones and other devices. We have developed a NFC antenna with
different graphene derivatives. Several designs, materials and configurations
were studied and tested. The graphene antennas was laminated on different
substrates like PET, PVC, Kapton, furthermore a silk/graphene paper wearable
antenna was prepared. This technology could be developed further within the
field of flexible electronics and communication technology."
The fully flexible graphene NFC device demonstrators were tested with a
smartphone through the NFC reader App by the Graphene Flagship partner
STMicroelectronics, showing good functionality whether flat or fixed on curved
objects.
"We demonstrate that, if this approach is performed in the right
way, the graphene antennas can be used directly in working devices, with no
additional tuning of, for example, software or hardware of the interacting
devices. Finally, some fully working graphene smart cards were prepared in
order to be used as electronic keys, business cards and other typical NFC
applications. We are exhibiting at the Composite Europe 2016 to find new
industrial collaboration partners to develop the graphene based NFC antennas
into large scale production," says Vincenzo Palermo.
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished November
DJIA: 19124
+53 Up NASDAQ: 5324 +51 Up. SP500: 2199 +58 Up.
he Tripura Board of school Education will be declared the TBSE HS Result 2018 in the month of June 2018. So all the students should be ready to check their Tripura Board 12th Result 2018 through the official website. Keep visit official website regularly.
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