Oklahoma

Houston, we have a problem-er. With a third of S&P 500 capital expenditure due from the imploding energy sector (and with over 20% of the high-yield market dominated by these names), paying attention to any inflection point in the US oil-producers is critical as they have been gung-ho "unequivocally good" expanders even as oil prices began to fall. So, when Reuters reports a drop of almost 40 percent in new well permits issued across the United States in November, even The Fed's Stan Fischer might start to question his lower oil prices are "a phenomenon that’s making everybody better off," may warrant a rethink. New permits, which indicate what drilling rigs will be doing 60-90 days in the future, showed steep declines for the first time this year across the top three U.S. onshore fields: the Permian Basin and Eagle Ford in Texas and North Dakota's Bakken shale.

It was recently reported in the news that Walmart is engaged in a(nother) “food drive” to help feed the needy. Isn’t that nice? Well, it would be, if it weren’t for the fact that the “needy” in these food-drives are its own employees. “Let’s succeed by donating to associates in need,” says the sign in an Oklahoma Walmart.

History may not repeat but it rhymes so loud sometimes that Einstein would be rolling in his repetitively insane grave. As Bloomberg notes, the last time that U.S. oil drillers got caught up in a price war orchestrated by Saudi Arabia, it ended badly for the Americans. "1986 was the big price collapse and the industry did not see it coming,” said Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy and Economic Research who has covered the oil sector for 37 years, "it put a lot of them out of business. You just don’t forget it. It’s part of the cultural memory." Think it can't happen again? Think again... consider how levered US Shale drillers are and just what Saudi has to gain from keeping their foot on the US neck... In 1986, the U.S. industry collapsed, triggering almost a quarter-century of production declines, and the Saudis regained their leading role in the world’s oil market.

If you could stay home and watch television, play video games and hang out with your friends all day at government expense, would you do it?  Of course most Americans that collect money from the government each month are not abusing the system.  Many truly are incapable of taking care of themselves, and others are just receiving government benefits (such as Social Security) that they feel that they have earned by a lifetime of hard work.  But with each passing year the number of Americans jumping on board “the safety net” continues to grow rapidly, and a lot of these people should be able to take care of themselves. What would our forefathers say about us today?  The following are 21 facts that prove that dependence on the government is out of control in America…

What is it with us? Don’t we want to understand? Japan announced on Monday that its economy is in hopeless trouble and back in recession (as if it was ever out). And what do we see? ‘Experts’ and reporters clamoring for more stimulus. But if Japan has shown us anything over the past years, and you’re free to pick any number between 2 and 20 years, it’s that the QE-based kind of stimulus doesn’t work. Not for the real economy, that is.

While it is unclear if moments ago the Mississippian Lime Play under south Kansas was the first major shale quake to hit Kansas, or this was simply the first yet to be named shale company going Chapter 11, but moments ago the USGS reported that a 4.8 quake located 30 miles SSW of Wichita as well as a various other smaller quakes in north Oklahoma,shook the two states.

If you require more evidence that the United States is a dysfunctional society, observe American elections. Election season is slander season. Each party’s attack teams focus on misrepresenting, defaming, and ridiculing the opposing party’s candidates. Attack ads have replaced debates and any discussion of what the issues are, or should be, and how candidates perceive the public’s interest. Each attack team tells lies designed to enrage various voters about the other team’s candidate. Whoever is elected is indebted not to voters but to the special interests that provided the campaign money.

When work is punished and grift is not, is it any surprise that, as The Washington Times reports, nearly 60,000 triple dipping Veterans picked up $3.5 billion in benefits (collecting their military retirement pay; and disability benefits from both the Veterans Administration and Social Security too). The arrangement is legal, but since everyone else is abusing the system, from crony banks to deadbeat dads to squatting slummers, it was only a matter of time before even veterans decided to dip, then dip again and dip some more. Sen. Tom Coburn, noted it was "hard to understand," but perhaps the hardest thing to understand is why it took veterans so long to realize we live in a world without consequences.

"Since 9/11, those thank yous have been aimed at veterans with the regularity of the machine gun fire that may still haunt their dreams. Veterans have also been offered special consideration when it comes to applications for mostly menial jobs so that they can “utilize the skills” they learned in the military. While they continue to march in those welcome home parades and have concerts organized in their honor, the thank yous are in no short supply. The only question that never seems to come up is: What exactly are they being thanked for?"

The problem for a city like Houston (or many others like it), with deep ties to the production and oil, is a "shock" from a supply/demand reversion could bring the economic "boom" quickly to an end. We are certainly not saying that the "wheels are about to come off of the cart." However, we do suggest that there is a potential for a very negative shock in the energy space given the extreme complacency that current exists. History suggests that true "miracles" are few and far between as most tend to just "illusions of hope."

Physical gold is being accumulated and used in exchanges but very discretely as of now. The geopolitical and economic environment in the last few months was in my view the calm before the storm. Both the economic and political environments are uncertain and will surprise the complacent markets.

"The audience in the ballroom of the Hotel Derek included engineers for shale drillers such as Marathon, Continental and Rice. Pamela Allen, a senior reserves coordinator for Marathon, raised her hand and told Lee that she was worried that using outsized forecasts in public presentations would run afoul of the SEC and “come back to haunt us.” Singhania, the Marathon spokeswoman, said she was unable to comment on Allen’s remarks without seeing a transcript. “If a lot of people get burned -- and I think a lot of people can and will be burned -- by these numbers in the investor presentations, there may be a push by investors to get the SEC to do something about it,” Lee said during the workshop."

...Funding War!

It appears the appeal of ISIS-supporting beheadings in Oklahoma is growing. In what can only be described as an uncomfortable coincidence for the state, a 2nd Oklahoma man was arrested Friday for threatening to behead a co-worker. As The Oklahoman reports, Jacob Mugambi Muriithi, 30, who was recently fired from his job at a nursing home, threatened a female christian co-worker that he "represented ISIS and that ISIS kills Christians." When she asked him why, he replied, "This is just what we do," according to the affidavit.

A man who had been fired from a food processing plant in an Oklahoma City suburb beheaded a woman with a knife and was attacking another worker when he was shot and wounded by a company official, police said Friday. As AP reports, while questioning the suspect's co-workers, investigators learned he had recently started trying to convert several employees to Islam. As the director of news and information for the Islamic Society of Greater Oklahoma City stated, "they have this ISIS thing on their minds and now this guy has brought it to America."