"His Excellency Ahmed Zaki Yamani, Saudi Arabian Minister of Oil and Mineral Resources from 1962 to 1986, and a Minister in OPEC for 25 years, famously said:

"The Stone Age didn't end because we ran out of stones”. In our interview with BBC’s Business Briefing in the morning of June 22, 2018, we predicted that OPEC+ meeting “will result in a modest and gradual reversal of the 2016 cuts”,

but only as a “prelude for far more interesting developments to unfold...”.

Two weeks on, we faced a potential US-China trade war, when, at 12:01 on July 6, 2018, USA imposed tariffs on $34 billion of Chinese goods.

Five weeks on Saudi Aramco announced acquisition of Sabic, ahead of its IPO...

On May 28, 2021, Shell lost a landmark legal case in a Dutch court, which requireed a 45% cuts in GHG emissions by 2030.

It was a warning sign for the rest of the oil industry, signaling legal exposure to Scope 3 emissions.

More litigation related to emissions commenced. The court ruling ordering Shell to speed up its plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions caused a sharp drop in oil and gas production.

At the same time, in the United States, ExxonMobil lost the board vote. Engine No. 1 said that ExxonMobil "must cut oil production".

Similarly, Chevron shareholders voted for Scope 3, and, in France, Total experienced similar pressures.

Overall, almost simultaneously, Exxon, Chevron, Shell, Total and other majors faced assaults by certain investors, regulators and associated factors.

"Renewable Subsector's development, if and where feasible, is not sustainable without planning and developing new infrastructure - almost from scratch.

Current valuation multiples remain unsustainable, as well.

Investors continue buying into early stage equity stories / companies on paper, without proper due diligence.

ESG agenda is misconcieved and, actually, simply wrong.

Macroeconomics continues to be driven by artificial and misdirected "stimulus" packages and other tools of liberal monetary policies abusing the concept of QE (quantitative easing).

Ergo, short of a massive increase in productivity, inflation will not be curbed by interest rate hikes in 2022, and the Fed know it."

"It was a pleasure to join the 3rd Texas Energy Forum at the Petroleum Club of Houston, and share views with the lawmakers from Texas and Louisiana.

Macroeconomic factors are profoundly interrelated with Energy Infrastructure (and)  remain driven by artificial stimuli / stimulus packages and other tools of liberal monetary policies such as the general QE policy...

As at Dec 31 2020, the Shiller ratio for S&P 500 reached 34, the second-highest next to the dot-com boom. Historically, when Shiller goes > 30, markets correct. So, why have they not corrected yet - due to QE ...

Ergo, short of a dramatic productivity increase, monetary easing policy, immensely accelerated during and post Covid, will remain the root cause of the stagflation to continue - now stepped up further through the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act" ...

Capital allocation has to be in productive projects in Energy and Infrastructure, in particular in Oil & Gas ..."

Interrelated Macro and Microeconomic Perspectives

NAPE 2023 was an exceptionally well-organized Sector event Chaired by David Cape, CPL, and sponsored by Sector leaders such as Chesapeake Energy and ConocoPhillips. The Governors Panel with Governors Greg Abbott of Texas, Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma and Mark Gordon of Wyoming provided strong support for the Sector.

“The amount of paper printed  is not the only problem. It’s the misallocation of it ... The Fed are saying that their interest rate hikes will fight the inflation… Obviously the Fed does not believe that… the Fed is counting on the recession ...”

“At the moment Oil & Gas sector is feeling optimistic because oil and gas prices are high…

but what will happen if the macroeconomic picture deteriorates even more - which it will.”

An M&A Energy Banker’s Perspective

22 min:
“Any investment in hydrogen where there is no infrastructure (whatsoever) and any investment in EV where there is no (adequate) charging infrastructure, is the bookcase example of misallocation... decline in productivity… stagflation.”

“I am predicting the failure of all of these “Green Energy” “projects” which represent misallocation of capital”
29 min:
“Going back to the stock market performance… They looked at ITM.. Plug Power… Ballard… Hydrogen EBITDA multiples were over 300x …Do you think that is sustainable? ... Misallocation of capital – right there... .com boom and bust will be a tiny little hokey stick  in comparison to this…”

34 min:
“... we see a lot of US taxpayer dollars disseminated around the world… We cannot complete due diligence on such projects…
We are going to see the repercussions of this unfolding over many years to come, because the money is ending up where it shouldn’t be ending up.”

From an M&A perspective: developments in the East #Mediterranean around Leviathan Project, Tamar Gas Field and #Gaza Marine exploration licenses awarded by Israel's Energy Ministry to British bp, Italian Eni, Emirati Dana Petroleum Limited, Azeri SOCAR Karyera, and Israeli NewMed Energy andRatio Energies, tangent on two publicly disclosed dialogues:

a) bp and Abu Dhabi National Oil Co's (ADNOC Group) $2 billion non-binding bid to acquire a 50% stake in the Israeli gas producer NewMed Energy, with a 45.3% stake in Leviathan, whereby the operator Chevron, holds a 39.7% stake while Ratio Energies holds the remaining 15%.
Under the non-binding offer, BP and ADNOC would buy 45% of NewMed's free floating shares and an additional 5% owned by Israeli Delek Group which would hold the remaining 50%, taking the company private; and

b) European Commission, Israel and Egypt's trilateral MOU on the supply of Israeli gas via Egypt's LNG export infrastructure to the EU, signed in June 2022.

Egypt imports Israeli gas from both the Tamar and Leviathan gas fields, offshore Israel, for domestic consumption and LNG exports from the 7.2 mt/year Shell-operated Idku and the Eni-operated 5 mt/year Damietta plant.