[ROCKMAN]

Sub - Two ways to quantify "uniqueness" of the two dominant oil shale plays...the Eagle Ford and Bakken (I know: taking a bit of liberty calling the Bakken a shale). A) the number of different shale formations (formation or geological formation is the fundamental unit of lithostratigraphy. A formation consists of a certain number of rock strata that have a comparable lithology, facies or other similar properties). And B) the thickness of each formation.

As far as A goes there are several dozen shale formation that contain various amounts of hydrocarbons. Not bothering to count the various different shale formation in the 10+ major US geologic basins I estimate the EFS and B represent 5% at most of the US shale formations. Globally? Way under 1%

And B by thickness? Let's keep it easy and just look at the Eagle Ford Shale. And I'll limit the depth to 16,000' which is easily reachable by the drill bit. In some areas of the Gulf Coast Basin the thickness of the sedimentary section is 60,000'+.

So the oil productive Eagle Ford Shale is a max of 300' thick. In the same area as the EFS play the total thickness of the shale formations is at least 12,000'. That doesn't include the shale intervals that exist with in the sandstone and limestone formations. So that's about 2.5%. About the same for the Bakken in the Williston Basin.

But now the combined thickness of the EFS and B compared to the thickness of all the US. Again I won't take the time to count them all so I'll toss out a minimum thickness: 600,000'. So let's over estimate EFS + B at 1,000'. So about 0.2% but certainly less.

And globallly? Crap, just making up a realistic number IMHO: less the 0.02%. Almost no one here has ever looked at a 16,000' well log and seeing how the entire stratigraphic section is totally dominated by rocks made of shale.

Of course none of those numbers are exactly correct. But it should give some sense how unique those two formations are. But that's not the only uniqueness to those plays: there is no country on earth that can match our drilling/frac'ng infrastructure AND the number of public oil companies so desperate to add proven oil reserves to their book AND the capital availability to fund such operations. There may be 10 foreign shale formation with the same or even better productivity then the EFS: and IMHO a ZERO probability of seeing the magnitude of production increases seen in Texas or N Dakota.

Thinking there might be is the equivalent of expecting some new tech that will produce more energy then the world will ever need at almost no cost.

IOW y'all ain't f*cking petroleum geologists. LOL.

[AdamB]

IOW y'all ain't f*cking petroleum geologists. LOL.

LOL indeed. Without petroleum geologists laying around, who would the petroleum engineers have to make fun of?

[rockdoc123]

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/12/why-oil ... llion.html

A good article explaining how Chevron will expand and benefit from the purchase of Anadarko. Very positive for their exposure to the shale basins in US and will help export some of the technology (Andarko has been very successful in some of the US basins) to Chevron's holdings in Argentina. The one downside I think could be Andarko's holdings in Algeria are significant. The change in government could prove problematic for them.

Interesting to see another large corporate acquisition out there. Chevron itself was responsible for one a couple of decades ago when it purchased Gulf Corporation. That purchase made Chevron who had been very unsuccessful with the drill bit for a number of years a sudden success due to Gulf's excellent holdings in West Africa. It will be interesting to look at the combined balance sheet of the new corporation.

[Tanada]

Chevron gets new U.S. license to pump oil in Venezuela again

The U.S. said it would allow Chevron Corp. to resume pumping oil from its Venezuelan oil fields after President Nicolás Maduro’s government and an opposition coalition agreed to implement a humanitarian program and continue dialogue in Mexico City on efforts to hold free and fair elections.

Following the agreement, the Biden administration granted Chevron CVX, -0.29% a license that would allow the California-based oil company to return to its Venezuelan oil fields in joint ventures with Venezuela’s national oil company Petróleos de Venezuela SA. The new license, granted by the Treasury Department, would permit Chevron to pump Venezuelan oil for the first time in years.

Biden administration officials said the license prohibits PdVSA from receiving profits from Chevron’s oil sales. The officials said the U.S. is prepared to revoke or amend the license, which will be in effect for six months, at any time if Venezuela doesn’t negotiate in good faith.

“If Maduro again tries to use these negotiations to buy time to further consolidate his criminal dictatorship, the United States and our international partners must snap back the full force of our sanctions,” said Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The U.S. policy shift could signal an opening for other oil companies to resume their business in Venezuela two years after the Trump administration clamped down on Chevron and other companies’ activities there as part of a maximum pressure campaign meant to oust the Maduro government.

– MarketWatch

[careinke]

Chevron gets new U.S. license to pump oil in Venezuela again

The U.S. said it would allow Chevron Corp. to resume pumping oil from its Venezuelan oil fields after President Nicolás Maduro’s government and an opposition coalition agreed to implement a humanitarian program and continue dialogue in Mexico City on efforts to hold free and fair elections.

Following the agreement, the Biden administration granted Chevron CVX, -0.29% a license that would allow the California-based oil company to return to its Venezuelan oil fields in joint ventures with Venezuela’s national oil company Petróleos de Venezuela SA. The new license, granted by the Treasury Department, would permit Chevron to pump Venezuelan oil for the first time in years.

Biden administration officials said the license prohibits PdVSA from receiving profits from Chevron’s oil sales. The officials said the U.S. is prepared to revoke or amend the license, which will be in effect for six months, at any time if Venezuela doesn’t negotiate in good faith.

“If Maduro again tries to use these negotiations to buy time to further consolidate his criminal dictatorship, the United States and our international partners must snap back the full force of our sanctions,” said Sen. Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The U.S. policy shift could signal an opening for other oil companies to resume their business in Venezuela two years after the Trump administration clamped down on Chevron and other companies’ activities there as part of a maximum pressure campaign meant to oust the Maduro government.

– MarketWatch

Well, (Pun intended), since Trump did it we have to reverse it. /Sc. I'm sure everything will work out just fine.

Peace

[ROCKMAN]

Deal began leaking since late Sept. Now stock is up almost 39% and flat for a few weeks. I'm sure a few folks in DC have seen a nice return. LOL

[ROCKMAN]

Sorry: almost 30%...not 39%.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Deal began leaking since late Sept. Now stock is up almost 39% and flat for a few weeks. I'm sure a few folks in DC have seen a nice return. LOL

Sorry, whether up 30% or 39%, it makes no sense to claim CVX is at all unique re rising a lot since late Sept.

I checked, and late Sept. was the low for oil stocks generally for the past 4 months. Looking at companies like XOM, CVX, OXY, MRO, BP, SHEL and COP (all large oil producers), they all had a big low late Sept, and have risen considerably since then. They all have a very high correlation since then. (Also, the crude price chart looks very different than that the past 4 months, with crude oil (WTI) only up about 7 percent over what it was at that time.

So, to me, the claim that the rise in CVX in the past 6 weeks is due to some secret political conspiracy over a single deal CVX was involved in is just so wrong as to be nonsensical on its face.

[ROCKMAN]

outcast: Chevron stock:

Sept 26 - Chevron $149.96 Oil WTI: $76.90
Dec 2- Chevron $181.03 Oil WTI: $79.98

So, the price of oil increases only 4% and Chevron stock increases 20.7%. So, the Chevron stock increase is due only due to the increase in the price of oil. Very sensible. LOL.

[Outcast_Searcher]

outcast: Chevron stock:

Sept 26 - Chevron $149.96 Oil WTI: $76.90
Dec 2- Chevron $181.03 Oil WTI: $79.98

So, the price of oil increases only 4% and Chevron stock increases 20.7%. So, the Chevron stock increase is due only due to the increase in the price of oil. Very sensible. LOL.

Sigh. I didn't say that. I pointed out that basically, the ENTIRE oil complex had SIGNIFICANT upward moves during that period, citing quite a few examples, and that they correlated HIGHLY with the move in CVX.

So it's not likely some political conspiracy theory or policy just impacting CVX with oil moving little -- it's something impacting the WHOLE oil stock complex (whether political, economic, perception, or the phase of the moon, re short term investor sentiment -- I have no idea and don't pretend to).

So not LOL, and I would think SHOULD be rather obvious, re my point that this is NOT just a CVX thing, but hey, people are going to believe what they want to believe.