Wall Street analysts are predisposed to be supportive of management’s M&A activities.  The sycophantic posturing that precedes an earnings call question with, “Nice quarter, guys” lives in the hope of investment banking business. Hence the response of sell-side analysts to Oneok’s (OKE) proposed acquisition of Magellan Midstream (MMP) is one of mild surprise at this […]

Oneok Inc (OKE) surprised sell-side analysts with their Mother’s Day acquisition announcement of Magellan Midstream, LP (MMP) at a 22% premium. Anticipated synergies of $200MM aren’t that big for the $18.8BN transaction value. Management expects that to reach $400MM+ but nobody can ever tell after the fact whether it happened or not. And given the […]

Last week the WSJ warned that We May Be Getting Used To High Inflation. Only 9% of respondents in a recent survey think inflation is our most important problem. Government leadership (presumably the absence thereof) and “the economy in general” were both bigger concerns. Americans are learning to live with higher inflation. The University of […]

The relationship between crude oil and pipelines exhibits the qualities of a copula distribution. This was suggested to us last week by a highly numerate financial advisor, commenting on the tendency of the midstream energy infrastructure sector to have its biggest falls when oil is also collapsing. It is an unfortunate historical truth that a […]

I looked through First Horizon Bank’s (FHN) 10K last week. They were in the news because Toronto Dominion (TD) canceled their merger agreement due to uncertainty about when they might receive regulatory approval. FHN’s stock slumped to below $10. The merger price, agreed in February of last year, was $25. FHN CEO Bryan Jordan told […]

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) may be the least appropriately named legislation in recent memory. That doesn’t detract from its impactfulness. Ever since its passage last summer, energy companies have been exploring ways to benefit from the uncapped tax credits and other subsidies available. The IRA provided an improved tax credit of $180 per tonne […]

The regional banking crisis rolled on with two key developments on Friday. One was the release of several reports detailing the errors that led up to Silicon Valley Bank’s sudden collapse. Poor regulatory oversight combined with an absence of risk management were to blame. The other was the slow collapse of First Republic, which is […]

This Friday’s inflation update will include the monthly Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) deflator and the Q1 Employment Cost Index (ECI). The Fed prefers the PCE because its weights are dynamic. When apples rise in price relative to oranges, CPI assumes no change in behavior, whereas some substitution towards oranges is to be expected. PCE picks […]

A wood-burning fireplace on a cold day is a welcoming sight. The crackle and smell of combusting organic matter has provided a place for humans to bond for millennia. Coal replaced wood as the developed world’s chief source of energy in the 19th century. Because of this some feel a misplaced sentimental attachment to burning […]

I’m the treasurer for our co-op in Naples, FL. I recently asked our local bank to pay a more competitive rate on our cash balance, which is well over the $250K FDIC insurance limit. Their deposit rate for business accounts was 0.5%, and maybe because Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) had just failed they quickly raised […]