Our Research

A ‘flibbertigibbet ‘is a flighty chatterbox. In our view, that is the oil tape right now: Every new dispatch on Hormuz, Iran–Oman talks, Saudi exports, dark tankers or U.S. sanctions becomes the whole story for…

We have been pressure-testing the potential buyer universe for Shell’s reported U.S. chemicals process (see our initial note: Shell (N/R) U.S. Chemicals: The Natural-Owner Test Is Live… According to the Financial Times). In our opinion,…

We believe Shell’s ‘chattered’ U.S. chemicals process (see FT/ Bloomberg article out earlier this am) is a very clean extension of our recent work on integration, system control, and portfolio design. In case you missed…

We are closing Model Portfolio III after generating an ~190 bps return year-to-date. Positive in absolute terms, the result was nonetheless disappointing relative to the opportunity set, the active risk assumed, and the performance of…

See within for full details. All relevant weekly news, what happened since Friday (to get you ready for Monday), and weekend commodity marks via Hyperliquid. We will be on the road in West Virginia next…

The quant driven, sentiment-based Love/ Hate Portfolio series (two-week short-term trading books) – that takes us ~30 minutes to put together every two weeks – is now outperforming our labor intensive, fundamentally based Model Portfolio…

Energy M&A (and strategic initiatives/ reviews, for that matter) may be entering its most interesting phase in years – but we do not believe the answer is simply ‘get bigger’ or ‘break it up.’ Let…

‘No one knows what that means, but it sure sounds provocative…’ – Will Farrell; Blades of Glory (ca. 2007) Actually, we do have some ideas on the topic: We believe the next phase of energy…

Our Key Take: ‘The debate is not whether $42.50 is a premium. It is whether it is enough of a premium to transfer control of the timing options.’ KKR’s reported $42.50/share approach to UGI is…

We believe KKR’s reported $42.50/share bid for UGI (according to the WSJ journal, which has a pretty good hit rate) may be enough to start a serious process – but perhaps not enough to finish…

We recently reviewed the year-to-date performance of our actively managed Fundamental Model Portfolio (see position detail within) alongside our quantitative, sentiment-driven Love/Hate series – and, let’s just say, the spreadsheet was not subtle. The Love/Hate…

TAS = My initials. Figured we needed some sort of new branded publication. In any case… We believe oil’s risk/ reward remains unusually asymmetric. Not because we know what the next Middle East headline will…

Within we present our latest Love/ Hate Portfolio (LHP17), with marks as of ~12:00 ET on Monday. Looks like a fun one. An MLP we haven’t talked about in a long time emerges as the…

CITGO largely moves under the radar in the public sphere – there is no public equity, disclosure remains limited and the ownership structure remains stuck in a uniquely complicated legal and regulatory process. But the…

Full details within. Timm Weekend Update The weekend takeaway: Markets look calm, but the energy and macro plumbing is getting shakier. Hormuz is not reopened and Iran is still treating it as leverage, the U.S….