195 - ESG out of style? | Garret Golding from Dallas Fed

White House LNG Task Force Compared to Secretive Cheney Oil Group
https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/white-house-lng-task-force-compared-to-secretive-cheney-oil-group
- criticized for lack of transparency

HSBC suspends banker over climate change comments
https://www.ft.com/content/8e1a16ea-bf63-45f8-81af-dc41c0df4e06

Energy crunch causing ESG to fall out of favor, warns ex-BP CEO
https://www.worldoil.com/news/2022/5/20/energy-crunch-causing-esg-to-fall-out-of-favor-warns-ex-bp-ceo/

Ukraine war creates new tensions for ESG investors
https://www.ft.com/content/b2869451-0899-4e02-8fc8-23d6d2ba9d17

- ESG: is it the first thing to go now that there's high oil prices?
- Elon Musk calls out ESG because Tesla isn't in top ten from S&P but Exxon is
- How can an oil and gas company be higher rated than an electric car company? Lots of reasons that have to do with biases in ESG ratings
- Are ESG investors missing out of rally in oil and gas? not necessarily.
- Can shale companies operate at higher interest rates?

Special Guest Garret Golding from Dallas Fed
https://www.dallasfed.org/research/economics/2022/0510
- long term decline in refining capacity in US - most acute in Northeast.
- delicate balance completely blown up by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Diesel/distillate market went haywire.
- Europe grabbing barrels from Gulf Coast and Northeast can't get Gulf Coast barrels due to Jones Act and backwardation.
- But this is changing! Lots of distillate going to New York. Colonial distillate system is now full.
- Will prices drop? Hopefully.
- Regional dynamics impact retail prices
- drop in oil prices is asymmetric with gasoline prices. Retail prices come down 3 times more slowly than oil prices. Much slower decline angers people but its how the market functions. Retail prices don't climb up at same wholesale levels. Store owner margins get compressed on the way up so they need to make up for it on the way down.
- Diesel is actually a less expensive fuel to produce but other factors are making it more expensive
- Middle distillates, lots of emphasis on producing more jet fuel and now diesel fuel. Refinery configurations aren't set up for it.
- Price spike may not persist
- Shortages not a real possibility for midwestern agricultural industry. price will be more a problem.
- volatility and high prices are arguably as bad for producers as they are for consumers. Demand destruction/recession would be bad. E&Ps would be happy with $80/barrel and are happy with $100 NOW but don't want it to remain. Would rather have stability over years than triple digit prices.
- high cost of drilling is huge issue for E&Ps and its getting worse, not better. Equipment orders are getting more backed up. Well casing, coil tubing. Big limitation on all the calls for them to produce more. Couldn't even if they wanted to. Labor is another piece. They are hiring but not adding as many as they would like. No improvement in labor bottlenecks over the last few months.
- Find out more at www.dallasfed.org. Tuesdays and Thursdays publish pieces. Heavy energy focus. Survey once a quarter. Lots of data available there as well.