Daily Standup Top Stories
Germany’s Net Zero Plans Include Taxing the Sun and Closing Stable Power Plants
In a bizarre twist of environmental policy, Germany’s push toward Net Zero emissions has evolved into what critics are calling a “tax on the sun.” This comes amid the country’s aggressive shutdown of reliable energy […]
UK Doubles Down on Net Zero, Restricting North Sea Oil Production
In a bold yet controversial move, the UK government under Prime Minister Keir Starmer is intensifying its commitment to Net Zero emissions by clamping down on North Sea oil production. Through a combination of elevated […]
The Jones Act Still Has a Stranglehold on Energy Dominance, and New Shipbuilding Rules Could Derail U.S. LNG Exports
In an era where the United States stands as the world’s leading exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG), achieving true energy dominance remains elusive due to outdated and burdensome regulations. The Merchant Marine Act of […]
New Uranium Plant in Kentucky is Just the Start
In a landmark move for America’s nuclear energy sector, General Matter, a burgeoning U.S. uranium enrichment startup, has signed a long-term lease with the Department of Energy (DOE) to construct a $1.5 billion enrichment facility […]
Oil and Gas Rigs Still Near 3-Year Low and We Need More Online
In the ever-volatile world of energy, the oil and gas sector is facing a paradoxical challenge: rig counts remain stubbornly low, hovering near three-year lows, even as global demand continues to push boundaries. As of […]
Highlights of the Podcast
00:00 – Intro
00:14 – Germany’s Net Zero Plans Include Taxing the Sun and Closing Stable Power Plants
01:39 – UK Doubles Down on Net Zero, Restricting North Sea Oil Production
4:56 – The Jones Act Still Has a Stranglehold on Energy Dominance, and New Shipbuilding Rules Could Derail U.S. LNG Exports
09:47 – New Uranium Plant in Kentucky is Just the Start
15:27 – Markets Update
17:59 – Oil and Gas Rigs Still Near 3-Year Low and We Need More Online
18:32 – Frac Count Update
18:50 – Earnings Update
22:24 – Outro
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Video Transcription edited for grammar. We disavow any errors unless they make us look better or smarter.
Michael Tanner: [00:00:00] Get ready to be taxed on your son use. Yes, your son used next on the energy news beat stand up. [00:00:06][6.7]
Stuart Turley: [00:00:14] Germany’s net zero plans, including taxing the sun and closing stable power plants. You can’t buy this kind of wild fun in a bizarre twist of environmental policy. Germany’s push to net zero emissions is involved in to what critics are calling tax on the sun. This comes amid the country’s aggressive shutdown of reliable energy, including nuclear and now coal plants under the banner of green energy. Michael, you can’t buy this kind of stupid. I embedded in this article, a X post and this lady is just absolutely beside herself with the amount of money that was thrown at people to put solar panels on their roofs. Now they want to tax you for having them on your roof and it’s called the sun tax. And now you’re sitting there looking at why is China has increased electricity production by 70% while production in Germany has declined by 10%. Net zero equals deindustrialization, financial collapse is what that actually equals. You cannot buy this. We’re going to tax the sun. Unbelievable, dude. And the UK, the next story doubles down. You ready for this one? Yeah, let me hear it. [00:01:39][84.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:01:39] Let’s go to the next story. UK doubles down on net zero, restricting North Sea oil production. Michael, this is their last hope for any kind of problem going on here in a bold yet controversial move. I call it The UK under Prime Minister Keir Starmer is intensifying its commitment to net-zero emissions by clamping down on North Sea oil production through a combined elevated taxes, stringent environmental regulations, and deliberate shift toward wind and solar energy. This is unbelievable. To discourage further investment, the tax rate on oil and gas extraction profits has been hiked to 78% Michael, I’ll tell you what, that is stifling oil and gas investment and the second order of effects. Norway is one of their biggest suppliers of electricity and natural gas, and they’re wanting to shut the UK off. What is the UK going to do when Norway shuts them off next year? This is absolutely unbelievable. Coal has been phased out. The reliance on gas exposes the nation’s global volatility, as seen in the post-war. This is unbelievable. These two go hand in hand, skipping down the road of stupid. [00:03:09][89.7]
Michael Tanner: [00:03:09] Yeah. I mean, here, here’s, I think the, the interesting part here. So it’s a tax rate on a, on oil and gas profits at 78%. Now me, the finance guy says, well, okay. Well, we’re just going to do some sweet accounting tricks to make it look like we don’t have any profits. You reinvest into R and D, you capitalize things at a higher rate. I’ll be hard pressed to see if anybody actually pays those rates. BP I’m sure has a great accounting firm or a great accounting staff that will be able to figure out how to weasel their way around this. I think what this does signify, and you wrote this in the article, is the fact that now all these oil and gas companies, this is probably going to be in the nail in the coffin for them to eventually leave. We already know BP hired as their new chairman of the board, a new chairman who has experience moving companies to the New York Stock Exchange, which has resulted in an over a doubling of the valuation. Okay, so the the chairman, Alfred Manifold. Okay. He, the company CRH changed their listing from the London stock exchange, the LSE to the New York stock exchange and the market capitalization doubled. If there was ever a final, in my opinion, nail in the coffin to get this done, it’s this. And candidly, I’m writing a little bit of a… I’m in the middle of finishing up a article for our sub-stack that will drop later this week. This could be the… The final step before BP finally puts itself up for sale and there could be an interesting buyer in the market here, which we will cover. It’s currently extremely undervalued. I’ll be shocked if Shell also doesn’t consider this. I mean, it’s the problem with central planning. You’re always going to incentivize something leads to a negative effect somewhere else. [00:04:51][101.7]
Stuart Turley: [00:04:51] Exactly. I found these two stories quite entertaining to write this morning. Let’s go to the next story, Michael. This one is absolutely a hoot. The Jones Act still has a stranglehold on energy dominance and new shipbuilding rules to derail US LNG exports. Michael, today, there’s only about 95 Jones Act compliant vessels in operation. They’re expensive, they’re old, guess how many LNG carriers the United States has flagged under the Jones Act? [00:05:28][36.2]
Michael Tanner: [00:05:28] I don’t even want to guess, I’m sure it’s low. [00:05:30][1.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:05:30] One. And I think it holds a coffee cup full of LNG. It is small. It was built in the eighties. The U.S. Exported a total of 101,396 LNG cargoes last year. At the same time, the global LNG vessel fleet has 792 operating tankers per data in the CLNG trade association. Of these, only one is flagged a US ship, but it’s half the capacity of a modern LNG carrier and primarily use services delivering to Puerto Rico. Holy smokes, Batman. The shipbuilding requirements that are in the trade plans that the Trump administration has are very restrictive and We need a minimum of six to seven within the next five years. Now there are it’s being built in the United States, not just flag. That is the key difference, Michael. [00:06:31][61.1]
Michael Tanner: [00:06:31] Well, and I also think that, you know, let’s, I mean, we’re just talking about energy. I mean let’s not even talk about the shipbuilding from a military and a defense standpoint. I mean if you really think that China’s this next great boogeyman and the monster, you know you think we’re going to help defend Taiwan with Aircraft carriers, probably not. We’re probably going to need something a little bit more dynamic, something that’s a little more crazy. And so from this, from that, let’s throw that out of the window. Let’s just talk about energy. I mean, California still purchases Middle Eastern oil. Why we can’t get our own U S oil to them because it requires one of these 95 ships, don’t even get us started about Hawaii. We all know how much, how bad Hawaii is or Alaska importing foreign fuels because of the Jones act. So, I mean, I think this six is low. I mean it does say it’s at least six. I mean I would say that number needs to be at least in the 15 to 20. [00:07:25][53.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:07:25] Oh, I, I agree. And I think there is something that needs to be done in flagged versus built. And I, that should allow the United States to buy 50 tankers, a hundred tankers and get us started with bias and buffer. [00:07:41][15.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:07:41] I got a question for you, because to me, this seems like an easy bipartisan bill to get behind. What, in your opinion, is holding up Congress from moving on the Jones Act? [00:07:52][10.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:07:52] 212 jobs by a union. So it’s 200 really? That’s all it is. That’s all it is. It’s a union that has a grip on a bunch of different politicians that have greased the skids and political graph and corruption. [00:08:06][13.5]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:06] Yeah. I mean, is it the longshoreman? Is that what it is? [00:08:09][2.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:08:10] But I got to go dig my numbers out and all those papers and research, but it is basically two hundred and twelve jobs and that’s it. [00:08:17][6.9]
Michael Tanner: [00:08:17] And this is where we have to be honest about capitalism. I mean, one of the first things that you learn in college, if you decide to study economics, which I happen to do, you learn about this idea of creative destructionism, that… There are periods of, there are always periods of capitalism where old industries are destroyed and new industries are pop up and those jobs that were destroyed, you end up finding new jobs somewhere else. And I think there is a little bit more of a nuanced discussion, specifically when we talk about what’s going on with AI. But if we’re really, uh, if the Jones act is really just supporting 212 jobs, that is truest form of regulation gone wrong. [00:08:56][39.2]
Stuart Turley: [00:08:56] It is 100% gone wrong. And it was built out of the 1920s to trying to help actually keep shipbuilding here. But all the regulatory processes, we’re down to four shipyards that are basically supporting the military. We have about two or three others that are coming back online. The shipyard in Philly has been bought by South Korea, and that does count and is coming back on line. So the, the Trump administration is making some headway, but they are not going to hit the self imposed barriers that they’ve got going on here. And it is a gigantic problem for energy dominance. Because LNG growth is going to be handicapped dramatically in two years. [00:09:44][47.6]
Michael Tanner: [00:09:44] Yeah, no, absolutely, absolutely. All right, what’s next? Let’s move to- [00:09:47][2.8]
Stuart Turley: [00:09:47] Let’s go to some uranium. New uranium plant in Kentucky is just the start. The landmark move for America’s nuclear energy general matter, brand new uranium enrichment startup has signed a long-term lease with the Department of Energy, the DOE as we call it Michael, to construct a 1.5 billion enrichment facility in Paddock, Kentucky. The project announced on August 5th at the site decommissioning. Diffusion plant signals a revival of domestic nuclear fuel production and could herald the beginning of a broader nuclear renaissance in the United States. This is gigantically huge, and HALO enriched between 5% and 19.75% uranium-235 is essential for next-generation reactors in the smaller form modular reactors. The project will leverage scalable cost-competitive technology. And reuse 7,600 cylinders of existing uranium hexafluoride stockpiled at the site, ensuring sufficient environmentally conscious operations. It’s pretty huge, dude. [00:11:00][72.2]
Michael Tanner: [00:11:00] Yeah, it really is. It really is, I mean, you’ve had a bunch of different interviews now with with good friends of the show, Nanonuclear. You’re deep into this stuff. The problem is we need it’s just like any supply chain. If the full supply chain is not in America, you are always going to be reliant on somebody else. And there are certain things where you need to make sure that your supply chain here. Now, do we have enough uranium here to support this? That I don’t know. Maybe we do, maybe we don’t. But we do. [00:11:30][30.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:11:31] We do. We do there you go. And, and part of the problem is the Biden administration had one uranium mine in Arizona that they were about to approve and then they got canned again. So we do have the mines. We don’t have the processing and this is processing. This is huge. [00:11:46][15.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:11:46] Nope, absolutely. So I think, I mean, we’re going to need to, as you say, have a nuclear revival. I do think this is an interesting, it’s an interesting time if you are a investor looking to get into the energy space from a nuclear standpoint, because really at this point, all that’s holding nuclear back is regulations. [00:12:01][15.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:12:02] All of this you bet and i think that the nano nuclear folks are going to be some of the leaders there’s about five other nuclear companies that i’m looking at interviewing their ceos as well too and also today when this airs i will have interviewed the ceo of liberty energy so them and Ron Gussick is going to be on for this next week. So that’ll be kind of fun. [00:12:26][23.7]
Michael Tanner: [00:12:26] I will say this though, this, this general matter company that you’re talking about. I mean, the, the people that are currently backing them. Well, first you’ve got Peter Thiel, you know, got some interesting, spicy connections and also in Q tell, you don’t in Q. Tell is to the CIA’s venture arm. Oh, geez. Oh, jeez. Hey, not saying anything. I’m just throwing that out as a fact. So yes. [00:12:49][23.0]
Stuart Turley: [00:12:51] We’re all about this, but yeah, the DOE has already got into some other mineral mining and everything else. So why wouldn’t we want the CIA and then holy cow, Batman. Absolutely. So very interesting. What else you got, Stu? That’s it for me, man. Let’s get rolling. [00:13:08][16.7]
Michael Tanner: [00:13:08] All right. Well, let’s jump over here and cover what’s going on in the oil and gas space, guys. But before we do that, let us quickly pay the bills as always. Thank you for checking us out here on the world’s greatest website. www.energy newsbeat.com. Stu and the team do a tremendous job making sure that website stays up to speed. Everything you need to know when it comes to be at the tip of the spear when it comes to the energy and the oil and gas business, go ahead and hit the description below for all links to the timestamps and to subscribe to our substack guys it’s truly the best way to support the show by subscribing to our substack the energy newsbeat.substack.com we drop a great great daily digest on what’s going on in the oil and gas and energy business we’ve had some tremendous feedback from all of our subscribers so we thank you there but please guys go ahead and give it a a subscribe over on subsec it’s one of the best ways to support the show and if you feel so cline. To subscribe and pay for our premium sub stack which has a bunch of cool features only for paid subscribers you can do that on a sub stack as well also guys big shout out to probably one of our favorite companies in the midstream space reese energy consulting you can check them out reese energy consulting.com guys if you need help in the mainstream space whether you’re an upstream company needing first purchaser or midstream contracts reviewed whether you are in the midstream space, and you just need a hand with some permitting stuff, you need a red team analysis done, anything that you need help with in the midstream phase, guys, Reese Energy Consulting is our go-to. They have clients that range from two people in our garage, all the way up to the largest publicly traded companies in the world. So guys, trust me, you are a fit for them. ReeseEnergyConsulting.com, go ahead and check that out. We love everybody over there. And finally, guys are you sick and tired of paying taxes? Because if you are, we have a great tax analysis that we’ve just added to our oil and gas portfolio survey. Go to invest in oil.energynewsbeat.com. To figure out, one, what your tax burden is and what it could be if you decided to allocate capital into the oil and gas space, guys. Again, that’s investinoil.energynewsbeat.com. Take that tax survey, fill out a couple other questions, and if you qualify, we will send you a bunch of information and possibly point you in the right direction, guys, that’s investedinoils.energy newsbeat. Com. [00:15:26][138.0]
Michael Tanner: [00:15:27] Top line indices, those two on Friday, you know, S&P 500 up about 8 tenths of a percentage point. NASDAQ up about a full percentage point, two and 10-year yields up about one and eight tenths of a percent point respectively. Dollar index climbs a little bit up two tenths of a per cent point. Bitcoin up at $118,000 or about two percentage points for the weekend. Crude oil actually finished the day flat after sort of, you know, really rolling up and over all day. Brent oil was down about eight tenth of a point, natural gas dropped below $3 by about 2.5 percentage points down to $2.99. XOP, which was our EMP securities contract, was up three-tenths of a percentage point, and OCH, which our You know, I think there, there theoretically is, and Stu, I’m interested in your opinion because really what held oil on Friday, everyone was waiting for this potential. What was going to happen with this Russia deal? Well, now all of a sudden Putin and Trump are meeting in Alaska, which could be extremely interesting. Oil was still down 5% on the week off, you know, sort of all of this potential tariff news, nothing actually happened on Friday, even though that was sort of the quote unquote deadline, but I do find it fascinating. Stu, what do you think of this Trump Putin meeting that’s going to happened in Alaska? [00:16:42][75.6]
Stuart Turley: [00:16:43] I think the big boys are going to be in the room because the corrupt Zelensky is now throwing he’s saying that the Bank of London and the France are telling him not to give up any land whatsoever. However, you take a look at the polls from the Ukrainian people and the parliament, he has no power to negotiate. It’s actually the parliament of the Ukraine that needs to negotiate and 70% of Ukrainians want to give up land in order to go ahead and do this. So Zelensky, please shut up, sit down and put your head in the toilet. I’m sorry. I’m tired of him. His wife is his wife is driving a $15 million Bugatti. He has now bought a ski resort in France. The man has stolen tax. [00:17:31][47.8]
Michael Tanner: [00:17:31] Dollars. I’m, I’m very interested in, in checking out his ski resort. I’ve, I’ve moved so many times here in Texas that I keep moving my snow, my snowboard from place to place and I’m like, why don’t we get to use it? So maybe I’ll go hang out at the, the, there’s a Lenski resort. [00:17:44][13.1]
Stuart Turley: [00:17:45] Were you in here on the same height level? [00:17:46][1.6]
Michael Tanner: [00:17:47] And it is interesting. We did also say, I think something interesting that we saw again this week was the 547,000 barrels per day that OPEC put back on the market. That sort of kind of started the week off. We did actually see rig counts, too, drop by one United States rig counts down to 539, which is, I mean, pretty, pretty substantial. I’m just, when you look at over the long-term, I mean, one week over week isn’t terrible. We’re down 50 from year over year. And last year we were down 60 year. So, I mean, you’re talking in a two-year span, we’ve basically dropped 100 rigs. You could theoretically say, well, productivity per well is going up. That we could spend hours talking about productivity per foot drilled relative to all of this other stuff. We did see the frat count spread drop by four. So, all in all, it was a pretty bearish week for oil and gas. We also did see hedge funds and money managers had basically dropped. You know, what was remaining of their long crude futures and options positions in the week to end August 5th, which mostly, I mean. Who wouldn’t? You know, the other thing is we have a lot of earnings drop. I mean, I’ll just go down and read you the list of earnings we saw on Friday. We saw Granite Ridge drop their earnings, Mach Natural Resources with the Midstream Company. We saw EOG, Dorchester Minerals, Kimball Royalty Partners, ConocoPhillips, LandBridge Company, Bring Energy, Avetal Energy, Riley Permian, Murphy Oil Corporation, Sand Ridge, Apache, Occidental, not really Occidental. Yes, Occinental and Talos. And that’s all, Stu, on Friday, So we don’t have time to go over all of them. But what I can tell you is that the market has reacted pretty positively to these earnings reports. Now, part of that has to do with, you know, prices were, this was the quarter two was sort of the last time prices were sort of at this cyclical, quote unquote, high. So if you’re wondering, Oh, is it just because, you know, are all these companies doing well, it’s more got to do with the fact that they’re posting profits that probably are beating expectations relative to what the street thought, but you have to remember what the price environment was. I do think companies were squeezing out, you know, most of these companies are beating their midpoint guidance per well, and so really the question, and I think what analysts are. Our thinking is, okay, is that? Is that because of well productivity going up? And you could make an argument for that. Is that for them just squeezing out the last dollar of profitable capex that they can before they begin to cut? Could be a little bit of that. It’s probably a little of both. It’s also now the time where companies are shifting towards their highest and most economic wells. I mean, let’s just be honest. When prices are $100, you’re not necessarily drilling your most economic acreage at $40 because you don’t need to. You can save that in the reserve. I mean there is this idea from a planning perspective that if you have wells that you can drill profitably at $40, it might economically make sense to save those and keep those in the inventory for when prices do drop and they become your only profitable locations versus when things are at $80, $90, or even $75, you can get away with drilling some of your tier one and a half, tier two acreage. So I think there’s also a little bit of that. It’s going to be very interesting to see what happens, Stu, but it’s going to be a pretty wild week. We are moving to two days a week. So guys, as you listen of this on Monday, we’ll be back in the chair on Wednesday to cover everything that you need to know in the oil and gas business. But my favorite time of the week, Stu, what are you worried about this week? [00:21:08][201.4]
Stuart Turley: [00:21:08] Well, I’m concerned about the meeting with President Trump and President Putin on Friday. And I do, I am sitting here looking at Bloomberg as we speak and the European leaders are asking to speak with President Donald Trump before the meeting. And if President Trump really does go through and really try to put secondary sanctions on India. And in force, those I’ve got mixed emotions or mixed signals right now on whether or not they’re enforceable, what the numbers are, there’s still a lot of mixed stories out there. I think it’s a huge mistake. So we’re in a, a few days of a, really an unknown at this particular moment, but I’m really looking forward to president Putin and president Trump speaking, and I’m going to be hopeful that they, the big boys can put the boy in the high chair because the Ukrainian Parliament wants out and they’re willing to give away land for the russian speaking ukrainians and i think that would be a win win for everybody to move on. [00:22:18][69.8]
Michael Tanner: [00:22:19] You heard it here from our Russian, Ukrainian analyst, Stu. So we appreciate it. But with that, guys, we’re gonna let you get out of here, get back to work, start your week. Appreciate you checking us out here on the Energy Newsbeat. Stand up for Stuart Turley, I’m Michael Tanner. We’ll see you Wednesday, folks. [00:22:19][0.0][1318.4]
