San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1923-03-25
DAILY OUTPUT
Of CRUDE OIL
SHOWS 4 LOSS
Field Work Seriously Ham,
pered by Recent Cold
Spell.
.PL MANY WELLS
Operators to Launch Wild
cat Campaign to Open
New Fields.
PLAN MANY WELLS

Houston, Tex, March 24.-The re-
cent March blizzard, something rather
unusual for this month, probably cost
agricultural interests millions of dol
lars, but it did not pass without in
jury to the oil business and delay Of
the opening of spring business. Nat
urally the bad weather interfered
with field work, even in the South,
and especially in the fields farther
north where cold weather means a
temperature close to zero.
The daily average production of
COCO barrels, the average being /, $780,
O75 barrels against 1866. 96j barrels
the preceding week, according to fig
California production is actually off
about 5000 barrels a day, but this
may be on account of the shutting in
of some wells. The movement of
California crude to East Coast points
is not quite as large as had been ex-
pected and the production has been so
strong that storage could hardly be
built fast enough. But the Califor.
the situation in the other sections of
the country.
During the last week. premiums for
light crude in North Texas for spot
deliveries were rather scarce. In fact
business has been rather slow with
the refineries and runs are being cur
tailed. This situation will not con-
tinue long, as business will open with
the real advent of spring and ship
ment of gasoline will be on with a
ttch h. Al
er.
Premiums Still Paid.
The same story cannot be told for
Oklahoma. In Oklahoma the produc-
ers of light crude are still demanding
and receiving their premiums over
and above the posted price. Business
has not been very good with the in
dependent refineries, but they have
continued their usual runs, stored the
refined product for the market they
know will open shortly. If anything
the plants in the Mid-Continent are
increasing their runs of crude rather
than decreasing. Should another
blizzard come down on the whole
country, the plants would be forced
to curtail operations and await for
the business to show up.
The refineries on the Gulf Coast
are boosting their quotations in keep
ing with the new posted prices for
Gulf Coast crudes, but movement of
refined products is not very strong.
One Houston refiner is shipping out
two tankers of lubes to foreign buy
ers this month and has already booked
shipment for overseas consumption
to be moved in April. Other refin-
ers are booking some business, but
they are waiting for the opening of
spring and summer business. They are
having a little trouble in boosting
their quotations since jobbers are not
in a hurry to place their orders at
this time and they do not seem to
realize that further advances are like
ly, especially if there is another boost
in the prices of crudes.
Drilling to BE Active.
Indications are that there will be
considerable wildcat work started in
the next few weeks, practically in all
sections of the United States. This is
especially true of Texas and the
Mountain states. Most of the larger
companies are preparing to put addi-
tional rigs at work in Texas, since
they realize that the Texas produc-
ton Is lower than it should be. There
must be new fields and it takes wild
cat work to find the new pools.
Mexican production is off as usual
and it is expected that March ex-
ports will show another large decrease
probably as much as February,
which was a short month.