In today’s “Futures in Focus,” Todd Horwitz, chief strategist at Bubba Trading, and Bloomberg’s Vonnie Quinn examine the impact of OPEC and the U.S. dollar on the oil market. They speak on “Bloomberg Markets.”
Stocks take a breather after a run of records as traders digest economic data
The bulls are trying to catch their breath after the stock market’s string of records. Stocks started the week mixed as investors weigh a fresh batch of economic data after the Memorial Day weekend.
Meanwhile, oil prices are lower on concerns that production cuts will not be enough to reduce the global supply glut. Yahoo Finance’s Alexis Christoforous, Andy Serwer and Seana Smith discuss the day’s top stories.
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United Facing $435,000 Fine Over Operating Flights With Unfit Plane
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration on Tuesday proposed fining United Airlines (UAL) $435,000 for operating 23 flights in 2014 using a Boeing (BA) 787 that the government claims was not in a condition to fly, according to Reuters.
The FAA alleged that in June 2014, United mechanics replaced a fuel pump pressure switch on the aircraft but failed to perform a required inspection before returning the aircraft to service.
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“The safety of our customers and employees is our top priority. We immediately took action after identifying the issue and are working closely with the FAA in their review,” a United spokesman said.
Shares of United closed lower nearly 2.5% on Tuesday.
Massive Leak Reveals Monster 18-core Intel Core i9-7980XE Processor: Should AMD Be Worried?
Who wants an 18-core, 36-thread desktop processor? Well, this could be on the cards in the near future as the latest rumor points at Intel not stopping at just a measly 12-cores with its imminent launch of its X299 platform and Skylake-X processors. Instead, there could be 14-core, 16-core and even 18-core processors that sit above what we’ve already seen in unofficial data.
Antony LeatherThis summer was already heating up at the high end of the desktop processor market with AMD and Intel already doing battle with Ryzen versus Intel’s X99 platform. Then we had the announcement of AMD’s Threadripper processors – a range of 10,12, 14 and 16-core desktop processors and next month I expect Intel to release its anticipated X299 platform with up to 12-core processors. Now, it seems, Intel is planning a far more potent line-up of processors, and that 18-core part obviously pips AMD to the top spot in terms of cores and threads, with Threadripper slated to max-out at 16-cores.
Antony LeatherIt’s a massive development if true as it means that Intel is nearly doubling the core count from its previous flagship, the Core i7-6950X, which has 10 cores, and that’s just from one generation to the next. Previously, the core count only rose by two from the 8-core Core i7-5960X to the 10-core Core-i7-6950X. With AMD planning to go all-out with Ryzen and Threadripper – both desktop parts that use common PC components, and also with AMD’s Zen architecture showing promise, this is perhaps not an entirely unexpected move from Intel.
AMD – AMD’s Jim Anderson announces Ryzen Threadripper at its recent financial analyst day – a range of CPUs that offer up to 16 cores and 32 threads
Of course, the most important factor is missing – we still have no idea about Intel’s X299 pricing and no clue about just how AMD will price-up its Threadripper processor range. However, many suspect AMD will continue to offer compelling performance for the price, although if this latest rumor is true, it will no longer enjoy an advantage in core count over Intel’s next-gen high-end desktop platform.
Are you in the market for a new high-end system? Does AMD’s Threadripper or Intel’s X299 platform get your vote?
These Biometric Earbuds Help Hack-proof Your Accounts
Security experts recommend enabling two-factor authentication to make your accounts as hack-proof as possible. Sometimes that means receiving one-time verification codes via a text message. Other times it might mean swiping your finger across a sensor.
NEC Image: NEc
NEC thinks verifying your identity is something that can be done without any extra effort on your part. That’s why they built a pair of biometric earbuds.
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The wireless buds, which look very similar to Samsung’s Gear Icon X, authenticate a wearer by utilizing otoacoustics. There’s a good chance that you’ve seen otoacoustic technology in action before — if you’ve ever taken a newborn in for a hearing screening test, for example.
The process is sort of like SONAR. A sound is played into their ear canal and it bounces back. In a hearing test, an embedded microphone listens for the echo. If one is detected the baby passes the test.
NEC Image: NEC
NEC’s headphones utilize an embedded microphone, too, but they aren’t just looking for an echo. They look at subtle variations in the signal that occur due to the unique differences in our ears. The signal changes subtly as it bounces back, which the earbuds then use to verify the wearer’s identity.
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How accurate are they? NEC says the otoacoustic tech in these earbuds has a success rate of over 99%. Fingerprint sensors can get even closer to a perfect 100%, but they’re not as convenient as a pair of earbuds you’re already wearing. They also can’t be fooled by fake fingerprints and they’re not as likely to be thrown off by environmental factors.
You’re About To See What 1.4-Billion-Pixels Looks Like
High resolution bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico
The Gulf of Mexico has had an incredible history, leaving scientists to puzzle over a landscape peppered with channels, canyons, domes, pockmarks, faults, and mini-basins. Now, with the recent release of a giga-pixel (1.4 billion pixel) bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico seafloor scientists are able to interpret one of the largest coherent 3-D seismic images in the world.
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The project was spearheaded by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), a governmental agency that oversees oil exploration and development offshore the United States. During the exploration phase oil and gas companies bid on 3 mile by 3 mile blocks for the right to explore for hydrocarbons. In doing so, the government requires companies to hand over their seismic surveys to BOEM.
High resolution BOEM map of the Gulf of Mexico bathymetry.
Now, the BOEM has convinced 7 different companies who own the seismic survey licenses to publicly share the bathymetric data in an aggregated map. Those companies are: CGG Services (U.S.), Inc.; ExxonMobil Corporation; Petroleum Geo-Services (PGS); Seitel, Inc.; Spectrum USA; TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Company; and WesternGeco, LLC.
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The completely free downloadable map is available on the BOEM website.
BOEM High resolution bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico
How Was The 1.4 Billion Pixel Map Created?
Oil exploration companies shoot 3-D seismic surveys to image the subsurface in order to understand the regional geology, structure, and hydrocarbon potential. To do this a boat tows along underwater air guns that create bursts of sound waves that travel to the bottom of the ocean and into the mud and rock beneath the ocean. Behind the sound guns are also receivers or microphones that can pick up very faint pulses of sound that are bounced back from the ocean bottom.
mmc.gov Schematic of a seismic survey acquisition
As the sound travels down through the water and into the mud some of the sound bounces back when it goes through a change in material (i.e. from water to mud). For instance, when the sound travels through the water-to-mud interface, some sound bounces back to the receiver and some continues downward into the mud. Eventually, the sound will hit another type of material such as sand and some sound waves will bounce back again to the receiver.
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Through this process, scientists are able to measure the time it takes for many pulses of sound in a 3-D array to travel down and bounce back to the receiver. Merging this data, geophysicists are able to create an image of the subsurface in terms of time measured for the sound to travel down and bounce back. Geologists can then input the expected types of material the sound has travelled through to create a model that converts time to depth. Finally, you have a 3-D seismic depth map of the subsurface.
BOEM High resolution bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico
Salt Underneath The Gulf Of Mexico
The pockmarks and mini-basins in the Gulf of Mexico are due to a deformed thick layer of salt that sits hidden beneath the surface. This salt was formed around 200 million years ago when the Americas separated from Africa and pulled open the Gulf of Mexico. The gulf was a smaller basin not fully open to the ocean, allowing water to enter, evaporate, and leave behind thick deposits of salt.
Eventually, the Gulf of Mexico fully opened to the Atlantic Ocean and sediment began to pile on top of the salt. The Mississippi River transported sediment from large portions of the continental US and dumped that sediment on top of the underlying salt. The weight of the sediment deformed the underlying salt, pushing it up, squeezing it into faults, and creating domes of salt.
BOEM High resolution bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico
The salt is less dense and more malleable than the surrounding mud and rock and thus tends to flow and get squeezed into overlying layers. The tenant of salt tectonics is one of the reasons the Gulf of Mexico is such a prolific hydrocarbon basin. The salt acts to seal in hydrocarbons and prevent them from leaking to the surface, a fundamental ingredient in hydrocarbon exploration.
Old vs. New Seismic Maps
This is in fact the second version of this bathymetric map, the first being much lower in resolution. The new map has an incredible resolution of one pixel equaling 1,600 square feet, approximately the size of a house. The new BOEM map is about 16 times higher in resolution compared to the previous map, which had a resolution of 27,000 square feet equaling one pixel.
BOEM High resolution bathymetric map of the Gulf of Mexico
To create the new map the BOEM stitched together over 200 individual maps from exploration companies. In total, the maps cover 135,000 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico with datasets that span over 30 years.
The public release of this 1.4-billion-pixel map will help scientists from academia, environmental agencies, oil companies, and governmental agencies further understand this prolific region of our ocean.
