The two best things about this recipe, ... are that it's really easy and it doesn't use the word 'roux.'

This is clearly a deal that's based on a higher-for-longer oil price.

Still, at the end of the day, it's not great.

I believe (the report) indicates that 4.5%-5.0% gross domestic product growth rate forecasts look too high, and it makes it harder to justify support for $60 oil.

Finally, he calls me up, and he says, 'All right. This is it. You're going to have to write this. It's going to have to be explicit. This is a deal-breaker.' So I wrote it.

If you can't find oil, you're going to have to buy it.

The size of the buybacks and the relatively low percentage that is being reinvested in the industry would tend to indicate that oil companies don't have enough new upstream opportunities and projects to spend their money on.

Oil demand growth outside (industrialized countries) has been weaker than expected and that is where a lot of the new consumption is coming from.

We think these messages are at odds with the comments normally made to investors regarding future oil prices and the ability of producers to meet demand, and we wonder if perhaps those messages are actually a better indicator of the companies' thinking.