The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported Thursday morning that U.S. natural gas stocks decreased by 34 billion cubic feet for the week ending December 11. Analysts were expecting a storage withdrawal of around 68 billion cubic feet. The five-year average for the week is a withdrawal of around 79 billion cubic feet, and last year’s withdrawal for the week totaled 76 billion cubic feet.
Natural gas futures for January delivery traded up about 2% in advance of the EIA’s report, at around $1.83 per million BTUs, and traded around $1.79 after the data release, the same as Wednesday’s closing price. Last Thursday, natural gas closed at $2.02 per million BTUs, and over the past five trading days that was the posted high for natural gas futures. A new 52-week low of $1.78 was set Wednesday. The 52-week range for natural gas is $1.78 to $3.95. One year ago the price for a million BTUs was around $3.91.
Warmer than normal temperatures are expected to prevail for the rest of this week, but a cold snap is expected in the eastern part of the United States through the weekend. Beginning next week, temperatures in the east are expected to warm up while the west and the northern tier are touted to be cooler than normal. Overall, natural gas demand should be higher through the middle of next week.
Stockpiles are about 16% above their levels of a year ago and about 9.1% above the five-year average.
The EIA reported that U.S. working stocks of natural gas totaled about 3.846 trillion cubic feet, around 322 billion cubic feet above the five-year average of 3.524 trillion cubic feet and 541 billion cubic feet above last year’s total for the same period. Working gas in storage totaled 3.305 trillion cubic feet for the same period a year ago.
Here’s how share prices of the largest U.S. natural gas producers reacting to this latest report:
Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), the country’s largest producer of natural gas, traded down less than 0.1%, at $79.11 in a 52-week range of $66.55 to $95.18.
Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) traded down about 2.7% to $3.80. The stock’s 52-week range is $3.57 to $21.49.
EOG Resources Inc. (NYSE: EOG) traded down about 2.3% to $74.07. The 52-week range is $68.15 to $101.36.
In addition, the United States Natural Gas ETF (NYSEMKT: UNG) traded down about 2.0%, at $7.02 in a 52-week range of $6.95 to $19.38.
Chicago, IL – December 16, 2015 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include Chevron Corp. (CVX), Royal Dutch Shell plc(RDS.A), Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI),ConocoPhillips (COP) and Encana Corp. ( ECA).
Today, Zacks is promoting its ”Buy” stock recommendations. Get #1Stock of the Day pick for free.
Here are highlights from Tuesday’s Analyst Blog:
Oil & Gas Stock Roundup
It was a week where oil prices dropped to levels not seen since Feb 2009 and natural gas futures settled below the $2 level for the first time in over 3 years.
On the news front, Chevron Corp. (CVX) set its investment budget for 2016 at $26.6 billion, down 24% from this year.
Overall, it was a pretty bad week for the sector. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures dived 10.9% to close at $35.62 per barrel, while natural gas prices plunged 9% to $1.990 per million Btu (MMBtu). (See the last ‘Oil & Gas Stock Roundup’ here: Devon Bets on Crude Even as OPEC Inaction Sinks the Commodity .)
Oil prices encountered the year’s largest weekly drop in reaction to bearish comments from International Energy Agency (IEA) that sees global oil glut to worsen next year in the face of slowing demand growth. Oil was also undone by OPEC’s latest monthly report that showed the oil cartel’s November production rising to a 3-year high.
Natural gas also fared badly despite a bullish inventory report that showed a larger-than-expected withdrawal. The heating fuel was weighed down by predictions of tepid early-December demand for the heating fuel due to mild weather spurred by the El Niño phenomenon.
Recap of the Week’s Most Important Stories
1. U.S. energy behemoth Chevron Corp. offered a glimpse of its 2016 capital spending plans. The integrated major has pegged its next year’s capital budget at $26.6 billion, down 24% from the $35 billion it expects to invest by the end of 2015. Of the total, roughly 90% will go toward oil and gas exploration projects worldwide, and 8% for downstream businesses.
In a separate press release, Chevron announced the commencement of production from the Moho Bilondo Phase 1b project, located off Republic of Congo’s coast at a water depth of 2,400 to 4,000 feet. Total production from the prospect – in which Chevron holds a 31.5% working interest – will likely be 40,000 barrels of oil every day.
2. Europe’s largest oil company Royal Dutch Shell plc (RDS.A) has received the unconditional clearance from China to proceed with its $70 billion acquisition of BG Group plc − a leading upstream energy player in the UK. The permission clears the final regulatory obstacle that was in the path of Shell’s BG buyout.
Following the green signal from China, the only thing that is left is the approval of shareholders after which the deal will likely be closed by early 2016. However, after getting the Chinese authorization, Shell added its intention to reduce global headcount by 2,800 from the merged entity.
3. The plunge in crude price – from over $100 per barrel in June last year to the recent $35 per barrel mark – has led several firms in the oil industry to take drastic measures to remain afloat. Treading on the same lines, energy infrastructure company Kinder Morgan Inc. ( KMI) announced a cut in its dividend payout beginning with the fourth quarter of 2015. The Houston, TX-based firm plans to lower its quarterly dividend to 12.5 cents, a 75% nosedive from the earlier payout of 51 cents.
Kinder Morgan plans to utilize the funds from the cutback in dividend to fund the equity portion of its expansion capital requirements. This would eliminate the need to tap into external sources for funds to a large extent. Management expects the cut to also translate into a sustained solid investment grade credit rating. The company expects to continue this practice of funding its capital expenditure plans through internal sources in 2017–18 also. (See More: Kinder Morgan Slashes Dividend by 75%, Hits 52-Week Low .)
4. Houston-based energy major ConocoPhillips (COP) released its capital spending budget and operating plan for 2016. The company’s 2016 capital budget of $7.7 billion is 25% below the expected 2015 capital spending and 55% lower than that of 2014. Of the total budget, about $1.2 billion or 16% is apportioned for base maintenance and corporate expenditures, $3.0 billion or 39% has been allocated for development drilling programs, $2.1 billion or 27% has been set aside for major projects. The remaining $1.4 billion or 18% is to be used for exploration and appraisal.
The majority of capital will be used for the development of U.S. oil fields, mainly shale formations in Texas and North Dakota, as well as for the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska. ConocoPhillips also intends to allot drilling capital to Malaysia, China, the North Sea and Canada. (See More: ConocoPhillips Updates 2016 Capex and Operational Plans .)
5. Encana Corp. (ECA) has decided to slash its 2016 capital spending budget by 25% from this year. The Calgary, Alberta-based oil and gas explorer also announced plans to lower its 2016 annual dividend by more than 78%. The announcements were not unforeseen as the company has been hit hard by the persistent weakness in oil price. Following the announcement, Encana fell more than 8% on the NYSE.
The company’s projected 2016 capital budget is in the range of $1.5 billion and $1.7 billion. Most importantly, the majority of the amount will be allocated toward four key oil and natural gas properties that comprise the Montney and Duvernay shale fields in Canada and the Eagle Ford and Permian shale resources in the U.S.
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The key is to give yourself options. They may not love any of the scenarios, but providing choices usually leads clients to eventually embrace one.
Despite solid advice, some clients just spend too much. Others, like the married couple we’ll call Matthew and Elizabeth, diligently save but still run into retirement-planning problems.
Matthew and Elizabeth became clients of Jack A. Bass Managed Accounts a few years back, looking to manage their portfolio and put a retirement game plan in place. At 66, Matthew was considering retiring. Elizabeth could finally travel now that she was no longer the primary caregiver of her mother, who had passed the year prior. Together, we looked at their joint financial picture and analyzed the situation.
Then came some bad news: They wouldn’t be able to confidently cover living expenses if Matthew stopped working. They were shocked, because they’d done so much correctly—worked hard, lived within their means and consistently saved for retirement, putting away $2.3 million between retirement and non-qualified investments. Matthew even ran some preliminary retirement numbers online over the years to make sure they were on track.
Part of the problem was that Matthew’s planning assumptions were too rosy. He didn’t assume he’d have any variability on his portfolio returns, he didn’t assume he’d have health-care costs once Medicare kicked in, and he didn’t assume that retirement could last more than 20 years.
We projected that if Matthew retired at 66, the couple would only have about a 70 percent chance of being able to cover lifestyle expenses without having to make adjustments to spending over time; if either of them experienced a modest long-term care event that ate into their resources, they would achieve only a 65 percent success rate.
Their miscalculations aside, the other part of Matthew’s and Elizabeth’s retirement problem was that they, like many other people, put others’ needs before their own, in traditional “sandwich generation” style.
When their kids asked for help with down payments on houses, they obliged. When Elizabeth’s mom needed in-home help for a few years prior to her moving in with them, they covered it. Consequently, these unforeseen events ultimately put their retirement in jeopardy.
Working toward a solution
Matthew and Elizabeth weren’t happy to hear they weren’t on track to retire, but they appreciated having a framework from which to choose their solution.
Ultimately, Matthew chose to work 30 hours per week so that his company could continue to pick up their health-care costs (saving them about $1,000 a month in Medicare-related costs). The part-time work allowed him to take off every Friday, and that gave him the added benefit of “test driving” retirement.
He and Elizabeth also decided to downsize their home and buy long-term care coverage. The LTC insurance assured that their children wouldn’t be faced with the possibility of someday having to assist them financially.
As with all best-laid plans and good intentions, sometimes things go awry with retirement planning. However, by exploring alternative saving tactics, you can still achieve your goal.
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