evening wrap, july 17

market vibes

NVidia trading $174.16 this morning and a market cap of $4.24661408 trillion.

Stocks leapt higher on opening, led by the Dow, ironically. Nvidia traded lower at 8:30 AM, ostensibly on the BLS jobs and retail sales data, which was pretty damn good. At any rate, by 9:00 AM, the storied stock was back to $173.00.

Oil rallied on news Chevron has reduced drill rigs and frack crews by 25%. The company is planning to hold production at 1 million barrels a day and earn $5 billion a year through 2040 with the notional price of a barrel in the mid-60s. The key to long-term, low-cost production is a technique called triple fracking.

“The growth curve is shifting to a ‘plateau,’ and it’s all about how long you can hold that plateau,” said Bruce Niemeyer in the Houston Chronicle this morning. The implication is production will not fall, but it won’t go up either, which has been the case for all of 2025.

In my opinion, CVX is joining the choir in Texas capping costs and moving on to find new places to develop resources. As rigs have fallen precipitously this year, total U.S. crude production has been steady at >= 13.35 mm bpd. and it might stay there unless trump has another card to play.

I metals, I had a hunch Platinum was going to be a shining star this morning, and it was. Silver is stubbornly flirting with 10 million shares (ounces) of expiration gamma tomorrow, trading at $34.64 as I write.

An August gold is stuck to its POC like a babe to mother’s milk. Let’s take a closer look.