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ALJ bearish 6.53
ALJ bearish 6.54
downtrend macd below 0
indicators overbought
stochastics rolling over down
bearish topping tail
shooting star candlestick
$ALJ Daily and Weekly Charts For Review
Pivot Point 1st Level Support - 9.05
Would you go long or short, on Monday?
Impressive.
California and Oregon and have a combined throughput capacity of approximately 170,000 barrels per day (bpd).
It refines gasoline, diesel fuel, petrochemical feedstocks, asphalt and specialty blended asphalts.
Alon primarily markets gasoline and diesel under the FINA brand name at approximately 1,200 locations.
In the retail segment, the Company operates 206 branded 7-Eleven convenience stores in West Texas and New Mexico, which offer merchandize, food products and motor fuels under the 7-Eleven and FINA brand names.
Substantially all of the fuel sold by these stores is produced by Alon's refinery.
"Bubbles are Good For You !"
Oil Refiners See Profits Sink as Consumption Falls
Recent protest by truck drivers in Washington/ Alex Wong/Getty Images
By JAD MOUAWAD
Published: May 14, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/5qz6op
While drivers are facing sticker shock at the pump these days, here is a bigger shock: high prices are putting a strain on oil refiners.
Valero, an independent refiner, said its first-quarter profit fell by 76 percent. Above, the company’s refinery in Paulsboro, N.J.
After last year’s stellar profits, American refiners are going through a traumatic period. In a time of record gasoline prices, some of them actually lost money in the first quarter, and for virtually all refiners, profits are down sharply.
Experts say the refiners are caught in a double bind. The price of their raw material, oil, is rising because of strong global demand. At the same time, consumption of gasoline in the United States is falling as a result of slower economic growth and consumer efforts to conserve.
However much the companies would like to raise gasoline prices enough to pass along the full increases in oil, analysts say they have been unable to do it. Oil prices doubled in the past year, while wholesale gasoline prices rose a mere 39 percent.
“Refiners are having a terrible time,” said Lawrence J. Goldstein, an economist at the Energy Policy Research Foundation.
For decades, global oil prices were tightly coupled to the ups and downs of the American economy. But in recent years, world oil prices have been pulled upward by heavy demand for diesel fuel from developing countries like China. American economic growth weakened in the last few months, but that has mattered little in the upward march of oil prices.
“What we see at the gasoline pump is increasingly driven by what is happening elsewhere in the global economy,” said Daniel Yergin, the chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates, a consulting firm.
Gasoline prices rose on Tuesday to a nationwide average of $3.73 a gallon, according to AAA, the automobile club. That is yet another record. Diesel prices also set a record, at $4.39 a gallon. Crude oil futures closed at $125.80 a barrel, up $1.57, or 1.3 percent, on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
In its latest monthly report, the International Energy Agency, an adviser to industrialized countries, reduced its forecast for global oil demand for this year, as consumption drops by a bigger-than-forecast 300,000 barrels a day in the developed world.
But that decline will be more than offset by growth from developing countries. Consequently, global consumption is expected to rise this year by 1 million barrels a day, to 86.8 million barrels a day. Nearly all that growth will come from China, the Middle East and Russia.
In the United States, there is no longer much doubt that consumers are responding to higher fuel costs by driving less. Oil consumption fell by 3.3 percent in March, compared with March of last year.
But even as gasoline demand softens, the price keeps rising, driven by higher oil prices. The cost of oil represents about 75 percent of the price of gasoline at the pump, according to the Energy Department; state and federal taxes account for 12 percent, and refining and distribution make up the rest.
The rising oil prices have led to a sharp drop in refining profit margins, or the difference between the cost of oil and the cost of gasoline. These margins, at $12.45 a barrel on average, are 60 percent below their year-ago level, and in the lower half of their five-year range, according to a report by UBS.
In response to falling gasoline demand and rising costs, refiners have cut their production rates. Refining utilization rates, for example, slumped to a low of 81.4 percent in the second week of April, compared with 90.4 percent at the same time last year. Earlier this month, refineries were running at 85 percent of their capacity.
All this has translated into a tough quarter for some refiners. While large integrated companies, like Exxon Mobil, reported big profits in the first quarter thanks to their oil sales, smaller independent refiners that buy their oil, instead of producing it themselves, have been losing money.
Tesoro, Sunoco, and United Refining all posted losses in the first quarter. The hardest hit have been small refineries that tend to process the most expensive types of crude oil into gasoline. Sunoco, for example, lost $123 million in the first quarter, while Tesoro posted a $82 million loss for that period, in contrast to a profit of $116 million last year.
“We’re just not able to pass along the increased cost of crude oil on the gasoline side,” said Lynn Westfall, the chief economist at Tesoro.
At Valero, the nation’s largest independent refiner, first-quarter profit melted by 76 percent. Its refining capacity allows it to process heavier grades of crude oil that typically trade at a discount. Still, its profit dropped to $261 million in the first quarter compared with $1.1 billion last year.
Some consumer advocates say they are deeply suspicious about the behavior of refiners who are sharply cutting production at a time of record gasoline prices.
“They are not sitting in a boardroom and colluding, but they can see easily enough where their benefit lies, and it doesn’t lie in a price war,” said Judy Dugan, the research director at Consumer Watch. “In a truly competitive market, you might see some of these providers try to improve their market share by reducing prices. But this is not happening. They are all better off by restricting production to keep prices up.”
Mark Cooper, director of research at the Consumer Federation of America, said mergers in the 1990s had cut the number of refiners in the country and contributed to reduced competition in the refining market.
“We let them accumulate market power through the wave of mergers, and we’ve been paying the price in the last five years,” he said. “If there is a small number of players in the market, they learn from each other’s behavior.”
The demand for diesel has been one of the main drivers of oil demand in recent years. Diesel and other so-called middle distillates are used as transportation, power generation and industrial fuels.
In China, for example, oil imports have surged in recent weeks, a signal that the government is stockpiling oil and diesel in anticipation of the Olympic Games. Beijing, the International Energy Agency report said, is seeking to avoid a repeat of the embarrassing fuel shortages and power disruptions that plagued the country last year.
Alon USA agrees to buy Valero's Louisiana refinery
San Antonio Business Journal
Thursday, May 8, 2008
http://tinyurl.com/6yfo5l
Valero Energy Corp. has agreed to sell its Krotz Springs, La., refinery to Alon USA Energy Inc. for $333 million, the company said Thursday.
The boards of directors of both Valero (NYSE: VLO) and Alon USA (NYSE: ALJ) have approved the transaction and the sale is expected to close in July pending regulatory approvals.
Valero could receive an earn-out provision valued in excess of $100 million if certain milestones are met.
The sale will also include working capital at the refinery, which will be valued at market prices at the time of closing.
"The Krotz Springs refinery is a good fit for Alon and this transaction is a good deal for Valero's stockholders," Valero Chairman and CEO Bill Klesse says. "This transaction is consistent with our strategy to concentrate on our core refineries where we see higher returns for the long run."
Valero officials said earlier this year that it would explore strategic alternatives for the 85,000 barrel-per-day refinery. It is also exploring options for its refineries in Aruba, Memphis and Ardmore, Okla.
Last year, the oil refiner sold its 160,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Lima, Ohio, to Husky Energy Corp. in Canada.
Valero officials have said previously that the refinery sales represent a strategic move to sell off assets at a premium to what the company paid for them.
J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. acted as the exclusive financial adviser to Valero on this transaction.
San Antonio-based Valero currently owns and operates 17 refineries throughout the United States, Canada and the Caribbean with a combined throughput capacity of 3.1 million barrels per day.
Alon USA is a Dallas-based independent refiner and marketer of petroleum products.
Web site: HTTP://www.valero.com
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7616 LBJ Freeway, Suite 300
Dallas, TX 75251
(972) 367-3600
(972) 367-3725
InvestorRelations@alonusa.com
http://www.alonusa.com/
Shares outstanding as of July 31, 2008 was 46,814,021.
Dividend Declared
| % Held by Insiders1: | 79.05% |
| % Held by Institutions1: | 29.00% |
| MAJOR DIRECT HOLDERS (FORMS 3 & 4) |
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Odessa, Texas-based Southwest Convenience Stores, LLC (SCS) is the largest 7-Eleven licensee in the United States, with over 200 stores located in West Texas and New Mexico. SCS is a wholly-owned subsidiary of ALON USA. SCS was formed in 1993 when Permian Basin Investments acquired 152 stores from Southland Corporation, now known as 7-Eleven, Inc. When ALON Israel Oil Company Ltd. purchased the Big Spring refinery assets in August 2000, ALON USA acquired a 34.4 percent interest in SCS. In May 2001, ALON USA completed the acquisition of the remaining interest. Since its formation, SCS has grown to over 160 stores and markets its fuel under the FINA brand. SCS has, since 1993, remodeled and upgraded its 7-Eleven stores throughout West Texas and New Mexico, with the addition of beverage bar upgrades, canopy expansions, pay-at-the-pump credit card readers and other capital improvements. SCS plans to implement new technologies to further reduce costs, while enhancing the customer experience.
http://stockcharts.com/c-sc/sc?s=ALJ&p=DAILY&b=5&g=0&i=0&r=7334
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| Mr. Jeff D. Morris
Mr. Morris oversees ALON USA's businesses, which include four refineries, pipeline operations, terminal networks, asphalt production and branded fuel marketing activities. In this capacity, Mr. Morris focuses on growth and acquisition opportunities for ALON USA. Mr. Morris is a seasoned professional and former FINA executive with over 30 years of experience. In 1974, he began his career with FINA and held technical positions in Chemicals and R&D, before assuming various managerial posts at the Big Spring refinery between 1982 to 1988. Mr. Morris became Operations Manager at FINA’s Port Arthur, Texas refinery, and was later promoted to Refinery Manager of the Big Spring refinery. Mr. Morris served as Vice President of Fina's Southwestern Business Unit from 1995 to 1998 and Vice President of the Southeastern Business Unit from 1998 to 2000. He was responsible for the Big Spring refinery and the Port Arthur refinery respectively, in addition to crude gathering assets and marketing activities for both business units. Mr. Morris is graduate of Texas Tech University where he earned a bachelor's degree in Chemical Engineering in 1974. He is an active alumnus and is recognized as a Texas Tech Distinguished Engineer. Mr. Morris serves as a member of the Academy of Chemical Engineers. He also holds 10 U.S. and six foreign patents in the field of polymer processing and production. In addition, Mr. Morris is published on polystyrene in the Encyclopedia of Chemical Processing and Design. Mr. Morris is also involved in numerous civic activities and serves as a board member of Dallas Communities in Schools.
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Mr. Jeff D. Morris is President and Chief Executive Officer of ALON USA. Mr. Morris joined the company when it was formed in August 2000 after ALON Israel Oil Co., LTD purchased the downstream operations of 
