Alan von Altendorf

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

Good comment, Mmarrkk, gave you a thumbs up.

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

@ toobad41 - Thank you. I appreciate your kind words. Yes, I'm ring-fenced by confidentiality, advice of counsel, and limited resources. Don't want to get tied up in shareholder suits.

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

Re natural gas shale plays, the industry was rocked pretty badly two weeks ago when World Oil columnist Arthur Berman resigned and editor Perry Fischer (11 years at the helm) was fired. See petroleumtruthreport.b.../ for a letter from Fischer and scroll down to Berman's "Facts Are Stubborn Things"

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

Thank you for great comments and questions.

One of the reasons I've been critical of Petrobras is their use of vendor finance, subsidies, and structural tendancy to negative cash flow.

I think an industrial enterprise should fund new projects from free cash flow and retained earnings. Call me old fashioned.

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

Texas Tea wrote:
> It is possible you are generating a panic to generate business...
> you provide a lot of service to both producers and financial
> institutions. This sets off a warning bell for me.

Partly true. I would like to generate new business advising investors and bankers ("buy-side"). By going public with criticism of engineer-led Monte Carlo reservoir modelling, I probably killed off our E&P consulting practice, which is okay because I've turned down several projects recently.

The Oil Casino: SEC Heading for Monte Carlo, Part III

I'd like to express my gratitude to Felix Salmon, Boaz Berkowitz, Art Berman, and especially Otto Rock for much-needed support in bringing this story to a wider audience.

The Global Oil Scam: 50 Times Bigger than Madoff

I agree. The production and "capacity" numbers are wrong. $6 a barrel gets you nothing, not even in KSA.

On Nov 12 01:15 PM singularityjumper wrote:

> WTF?
>
> It's called providing liquidity!
>
> NEVER engage in a market that is simply one buyer and one seller!
> Actually that's not even a market.
>
> Where do people come up with this Starbucks fueled (or Tequila maybe)
> populist delusion to explain the financial markets?
>
> I propose this author gets a permanent ban from posting on SA.

The End of the Oil Age? Not Quite

Satire? - "enlighted [sic] states like Utah and Oklahoma"

BP Strikes Black Gold: A Boon for Energy ETFs?

Jr doesn't understand young sands and rapid subsidence.


On Sep 08 02:34 PM Jrbarnes wrote:

> BP's find at 25k feet is hardly likely to be oil. At that depth,
> the termperature and pressure cook the hydocarbons into natural gas,
> not oil. BP carefull refer to BOE, or barrels of oil equivalent in
> their press release. Natural gas in in oversupply, and selling for
> $3 per mcf or less at the well head. It is hghly unlikely that wells
> like BP's can be affordably drilled and produced at these natural
> gas prices.

Tiber Oilfield Spells Major Upside for Prices

On Sep 09 04:37 PM Elliott Gue wrote:
> If you're looking for a more direct play on accelerating deepwater
> development one area to keep an eye on would be subsea equipment
> producers like FMC Tech (seekingalpha.com/symbo...) or Cooper
> Cameron (seekingalpha.com/symbo...)

Absolutely correct.

Tiber Oilfield Spells Major Upside for Prices

Excellent article. Really refreshing to hear someone talk sense about recovery rate and development timeline. A couple comments: Tiber and Tupi "reserves" are theoretical, conjectural. Development costs will be heavy, perhaps as high as $50 per recovered barrel, if you discount opportunity cost of money, pipeline infrastructure, sand and corrosion.

BP is betting on $200 barrel.

BP Strikes Oil, Enhances Exploration Potential in Gulf of Mexico

On Sep 03 02:27 PM Uncle Pie wrote:
>Wake up, America!

BP didn't discover anything. It was Amoco and Transocean.

Investing in China's Energy Shopping Spree

I agree with Ferdinand, the next Chinese target is Orinoco.

Crude Oil Demand and the Quick Recovery Hoax

Good comments from knowledgeable people. My two cents, I'll echo what Dennis said about Shell cutting staff -- all contractors and some early retiree middle managers. They're cutting exploration, keeping the bean counters, lawyers, brokers and midstream engineers.

BP: Beyond Petroleum and Back

Paul, cut proven in half to get recoverable, then cut it half again to discount their blue sky reservoir modelling and political risk.