“When I was a boy, I was told that anybody could become President. I'm beginning to believe it” - Clarence Darrow (~100yrs ago)

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SHELL.

Shell’s aptly-named Project Reshape (an aggressive cost-cutting review) reminds us of Liposuction:

“Liposuction is a type of fat-removal procedure used in plastic surgery.”
“Evidence does not support an effect on weight beyond a couple of months & does not appear to affect obesity-related problems.”
“In the United States, liposuction is the most common cosmetic surgery” - Wikipedia

Cutting the costs of O&G operations *will not help LT renewables economics*.

[Other parallels to the oil-patch should be obvious]

In any event, someone really needs to hear *that*.

And, in fairness to Shell, “someone” is probably an audience that management reports to -

LIBYA.

On Sunday, we noticed Libya correspondent Chris Stephen reporting that:

“Libya's NOC says re-opening oil ports/fields not held by mercenaries. Sources say include Tobruk's Hariga & Zueitina. Agoco (AG), biggest eastern producer, restarting fields. Status of deal to end shutdown unclear, Tripoli government PM yet to agree” - Chris Stephen

On Monday morning, the situation wasn’t exactly clear…

What is clear is that when production restarts, the market is going to have ~500k+ more barrels to digest:

“Goldman Sachs forecasts that Libya’s output will rise to 550k bopd by the end of the year” - Bloomberg

For more, we recommend reading Dan Graeber’s latest, as well as this piece out of Libya, late last night -

OTHER NEWS.

To us, Ted Seides’ podcast is the Rougned Odor of financial podcasts - a low batting average, *but* - when he connects - Ted knocks it out of the park.

His most recent podcast episode, featuring Sir Paul Marshall (cofounder of Marshall Wace), is a homerun -

Haynes Boone’s Energy Roundup is updated through August
RBL BB redetermination season is almost upon us
On Oxy, & the Berkshire dividend
A bit of oil history: drilling rigs & Sherwood Forest

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That’s it for this week - we’ll largely leave politics out going forward - sports, on the other hand, we’ll get back to that next week -

Reserve Report

Shell's Reshape