There’s a plan: President Donald Trump has signed his first piece of major legislation, a $1 trillion spending bill to fund the government through September, The Associated Press reports. The bill cleared both houses of Congress this week and Trump signed it behind closed doors at his home in central New Jersey, well ahead of a midnight Friday deadline for some government functions to begin shutting down. But other battles over government spending lie ahead. Among those are the border wall Trump has vowed to build on the U.S.-Mexico border to deter illegal immigration, as well as a promised military buildup.
Know the drill: The number of oil and gas rigs in U.S. fields rose for the 16th straight week as oil companies, especially in Texas and Louisiana, continue to drill despite a recent dip in oil prices, FuelFix.com reports. This week’s U.S. count jumped seven, a boom of more than 470 rigs since its recent low last spring. U.S. oil drillers collectively sent six more rigs into the patch this week, according to the weekly tally by Houston oilfield services company Baker Hughes. Gas drillers rose by two. Texas added six rigs, mostly in West Texas’s white-hot Permian Basin, and Louisiana added four. The total rig count jumped to 877, up from a low of 404 in May, and up 462 year over year. FuelFix.com has the full story.
Taking stock: Oil stocks are drowning in a sea of cheap crude prices, which tumbled this week to a five-month low, CNN Money reports. Six of the S&P 500’s bottom 10 stocks this year are in the oil business, led by 25% plunges from Transocean, Hess and Anadarko Petroleum. Crude prices rebounded by more than 2% on Friday, but the energy sector remains the worst-performing group of the S&P 500. It’s down 11% in 2017, a year that has otherwise been a strong one for the stock market. The oil slump marks yet another reversal in the notoriously boom-to-bust industry. The long-awaited “rebalancing” of the oversupplied oil market hasn’t really happened, largely due to resurgent supply from US shale producers. Read the full story in CNN Money.
