February 15 2024
Shale revolution
1 Mass shooting marred KC Chiefs victory parade
2 Russians develop secret space weapon?
3 Shale oil revolution enters new phase
4 Electric vehicles boom short circuits
5 Costs of owning a car increasing
2/15/1898 The USS Maine explodes
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1 Mass shooting marred KC Chiefs victory parade
Twenty-two people were shot, including one killed, Wednesday at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory rally at Union Station, according to police. The gunfire, which broke out near the end of the citywide celebration amid thousands of fans and onlookers, sent nine children to the hospital with bullet wounds and broke up the event in chaos. The number of known casualties continued to increase throughout the day as people arrived at hospitals, with the latest figures given later Wednesday by Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves in a news conference at police headquarters. Lisa Lopez-Galvan, a Johnson County mother of two and beloved disc jockey in Kansas City, died from her injuries in the shooting, friends confirmed to The Star after talking to the family.
KC Star
https://www.kansascity.com/news/local/article285484737.html?deviceId=B7012849-6A39-42F3-B94C-A1DC8E705917&tempKey=value
2 Russians develop secret space weapon?
The United States has informed Congress and its allies in Europe about Russian advances on a new, space-based nuclear weapon designed to threaten America’s extensive satellite network, according to current and former officials briefed on the matter. Such a satellite-killing weapon, if deployed, could destroy civilian communications, surveillance from space and military command-and control operations by the United States and its allies. At the moment, the United States does not have the ability to counter such a weapon and defend its satellites, a former official said. Officials said that the new intelligence, which they did not describe in detail, raised serious questions about whether Russia was preparing to abandon the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which bans all orbital nuclear weapons. But since Russia does not appear close to deploying the weapon, they said, it is not considered an urgent threat. The intelligence was made public, in part, in a cryptic announcement on Wednesday by Representative Michael R. Turner, Republican of Ohio and the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. He called on the Biden administration to declassify the information without saying specifically what it was.
NYT
Ed. Note: The secret space weapon is possibly hypersonic nuclear weapons. This article goes through the strategic implications.
http://asiatimes.com/2018/12/russias-hypersonic-icbm-blows-away-arms-agreements/
Ed. Note: it’s easy to scan over a story about oil but the US shale revolution is the single most important story in domestic and foreign affairs in decades
3 Shale oil revolution enters new phase
The shale revolution that began about 15 years ago saw a proliferation of thousands of small-time drillers turn the global energy order on its head and restored the US to the status of world’s biggest producer. Today, as a multibillion-dollar wave of consolidation washes over the Permian Basin — the engine room of America’s oil industry — that landscape has been transformed. A handful of heavy hitters is now firmly in control. Diamondback Energy’s $26bn deal for rival Endeavor Energy this week brought to almost $180bn the value of an oil and gas dealmaking spree that has reverberated across the US shale patch since the beginning of last year as big, publicly listed players swallowed rivals. Just 10 companies will now control more than 6.4mn barrels of oil equivalent a day of the Permian’s 12.1mn boe/d of overall output, according to Wood Mackenzie, a consultancy. Six companies will each produce more than 700,000 boe/d — more than some Opec member countries.
For now, companies are focused on getting their transactions over the line. Exxon, Chevron and Occidental’s deals are being studied by US competition regulators. Analysts do not expect the Federal Trade Commission to block any of the deals. But at some point, said Beeker, the continued concentration of control of America’s oil heartlands could “raise red flags”.
FT
4 Electric vehicles boom short circuits
As recently as a year ago, automakers were struggling to meet the hot demand for electric vehicles. In a span of months, though, the dynamic flipped, leaving them hitting the brakes on what for many had been an all-out push toward an electric transformation. A confluence of factors had led many auto executives to see the potential for a dramatic societal shift to electric cars: government regulations, corporate climate goals, the rise of Chinese EV makers, and Tesla’s stock valuation, which, at roughly $600 billion, still towers over the legacy car companies. But the push overlooked an important constituency: the consumer. Last summer, dealers began warning of unsold electric vehicles clogging their lots. Ford, General Motors, Volkswagen and others shifted from frenetic spending on EVs to delaying or downsizing some projects. Dealers who had been begging automakers to ship more EVs faster are now turning them down. Even Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk warned of “notably lower” growth in vehicle deliveries for the company in 2024. “This has been a seismic change in the last six months of last year that will rapidly sort out winners and losers in our industry,” said Ford Chief Executive Jim Farley on an earnings call in early February.
Ford has pulled back on EV investment and could delay some vehicle launches, while increasing production of hybrids, which run on both gasoline and electricity. It lost a staggering $4.7 billion last year on its battery-powered car business and projects an even bigger loss this year, in the range of $5 billion to $5.5 billion.
5 Costs of owning a car increasing
Many of the costs related to car ownership continued to outpace the consumer-price index last month. Car insurance premiums rose 20.6% in January from a year earlier. A trip to the mechanic, the price of a parking space, and highway tolls are also up, offsetting the savings from one of the big exceptions, falling gas prices.
In the fourth quarter of last year, 7.7% of auto loans transitioned to delinquency on an annualized basis, according to the New York Fed—the highest rate in 13 years.
The total annual cost of owning a new car, including expenses such as gas and insurance, climbed to $12,182 in 2023, up from $10,728 in 2022, according to the latest estimates from AAA.
The price of a new car itself rose a mellow 0.7% year-over-year, according to Labor Department data. But that was from an already high base. The average transaction price on a new vehicle rose from $39,813 in January 2021 to $47,358 last month.
The rising cost of maintenance and body work is also driving up insurance rates. That fender bender may cost 7.9% more than a year ago, given the surge in the price of repairs.
AAA estimated that depreciation cost drivers $4,538 in 2023 if they drove 15,000 miles, versus $3,656 in 2022.
WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/personal-finance/inflation-car-prices-ownership-insurance-7cac91f1
2/15/1898 The USS Maine explodes in Cuba’s Havana Harbor, prompting Spanish-American War
A massive explosion of unknown origin sinks the battleship USS Maine in Cuba’s Havana harbor on February 15, 1898, killing 260 of the fewer than 400 American crew members aboard. An official U.S. Naval Court of Inquiry ruled in March that the ship was blown up by a mine, without directly placing the blame on Spain. Much of Congress and a majority of the American public expressed little doubt that Spain was responsible and called for a declaration of war. Subsequent diplomatic failures to resolve the Maine matter, coupled with United States indignation over Spain’s brutal suppression of the Cuban rebellion and continued losses to American investment, led to the outbreak of the Spanish-American War in April 1898. Within three months, the United States had decisively defeated Spanish forces on land and sea, and in August an armistice halted the fighting. On December 12, 1898, the Treaty of Paris was signed between the United States and Spain, officially ending the Spanish-American War and granting the United States its first overseas empire with the ceding of such former Spanish possessions as Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. In 1976, a team of American naval investigators concluded that the Maine explosion was likely caused by a fire that ignited its ammunition stocks, not by a Spanish mine or act of sabotage.
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