Search results matching tag 'Toyota'

Toyota's Prius threatened by probe

Kim Peterson — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:19:00 GMT

Could the Prius and other Toyota hybrids be banned from the U.S.? It seems unthinkable, but that's one possible ending to a patent investigation launched this week.

This case centers around Paice, a tiny Florida company that has patented a way to apply force to a car's wheels from the electric motor or the internal combustion engine.

Paice thinks that Toyota (TM) is infringing on its technology, and is going after the automaker in court. The legal spat became much more serious for Toyota this week, when the U.S. International Trade Commission decided to investigate the matter.

Bing: How do hybrid cars work?

The problem is that the ITC can stop any imports that infringe on U.S. patents. So in the worst-case scenario for Toyota, the commission could ban the hybrid Camry, third-generation Prius, Lexus HS250h sedan and Lexus RX450h SUV, according to Bloomberg.

And that could potentially be devastating for Toyota, which Bloomberg says has sold more than 1.1 million hybrids in the U.S. in the last decade -- most of them Prius cars.

Paice won a 2005 patent suit against Toyota in federal court in Marshall, Tex. And you might snicker at that, because Marshall is notorious for granting all sorts of wacko patent cases. But still, the verdict was upheld on appeal, and a judge ordered Toyota to pay royalties to Paice based on car sales.

Paice has more lawsuits against Toyota in the Marshall court, and some may go to trial in January.

So can't Toyota just throw a little licensing money at Paice and make it go away? It's not that easy, according to one lawyer familiar with the case. Paice wants the cars banned.

"As soon as Paice wins an exclusion order from the ITC, Toyota’s in trouble," the lawyer, Michael Murphy, told HybridCars.com. "It doesn’t matter that Toyota can appeal that decision. And it doesn’t matter that Toyota might eventually have that decision overturned. For some indeterminate period of time, perhaps months, Toyota is stuck without any ability to bring these new vehicles into the United States and sell them. Think of the cost. Toyota would lose millions of dollars."

Realistically, the chances that Toyota hybrids will be banned are slim. Paice likely would accept big money -- not puny licensing payments -- from Toyota in return for dropping its complaints, so there is a way out for Toyota here.

At any rate, this isn't helping Toyota in the U.S. The automaker saw its sales drop 29% through August in the U.S., its largest market, and is struggling to revive its business here.

Toyota is still blazing ahead with its hybrids, and plans to add one or two more versions of the Prius, according to Reuters. Toyota also plans to spend $1 million in a marketing blitz in the fourth quarter -- about 30% to 40% more than it would normally spend to promote its cars.

Image credit: Mytho88, GNU Free Documentation license

Toyota gains upper hand with Prius

Even Toyota can't escape the recession

Chrysler may not make another year

Douglas McIntyre — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:31:00 GMT

Rumors, credible rumors, are beginning to circulate in the car industry and the automotive press, that Chrysler may not make it another year primarily due to its falling sales and growing financial losses at partner Fiat.

Chrysler sold a 62,197 cars in September, down 42% from the same month last year. The figure was down from 93,222 in August when traffic to dealers was pushed up by the ”cash for clunkers” program.

Chrysler’s problems may only be beginning and, if so, Fiat, the ”managing partner” among Chrysler’s owners may not be able to keep the American company intact.

Chrysler has operated at a disadvantage to the Japanese for some time. That has been true of all three U.S. car companies. Now that each has restructured, each has more leverage against a lower costs base. That should allow General Motors, Ford (F), and Chrysler to make an operating profit even with domestic light vehicles sales running at a rate of only 10 million a year. But, Chrysler still has disadvatages which start with the age of its fleet and extend to the problem that it no longer has enough market share to cover even a lower cost base.

GM has the capital and the daring to offer its cars for a 60-day test drive. There is some financial risk to the action, but GM has enough new models coming to market that the odds of people turning in cars is relatively small.

GM had a hard September with sales down 45% to 156,673, but the new promotion ought to improve its share in October and November. Ford has demonstrated the ongoing strength of its new model line. In September, Ford’s sales only dropped 5% to 114,655. That means that Ford is picking up market share rapidly and some of that is probably coming at Chrysler’s expense.

The Congressional Oversight Panel has already said taxpayers will not see most of the $81 billion that they put into the American car industry. The $14.3 billion put into Chrysler is more and more likely to be lost completely. The biggest single loser if Chrysler cannot survive is the UAW which owns 55% of the company.

The daily management of Chrysler is controlled by Fiat which owns 20% of the U.S. company with options which could take that amount to 35%. Fiat has not put any money into Chrysler, so if the American firm becomes a significant operational or management burden there are very few reason for the Italian company, which has sales troubles of its own in Europe, to stay long term. Fiat lost $254 million in the second quarter, so its board may eventually believe that Chrysler is a distraction and one without a future.

Chrysler is not just up against the traditional competition of its two domestic rivals and Toyota (TM), Honda (HMC), and Nissan. South Korean upstart Hyundai is posting sales improvements even as the car market remains weak and in September it posted a sales increase of 27% to 31,511, about half of Chrysler’s sales for the month. Hyundai’s strength is in small fuel-efficient cars, the market where Chrysler needs to find success with its products and those from Fiat.

At this point, the Chrysler product line is still dominated by mid-sized sedans, SUVs from Jeep, minivans, and pick-ups like the Dodge Ram. The company has no real product in the alterative energy/hybrid segment. Chrysler’s domestic market share in September 2008 was 11.1%, according to Edmunds. Based on sales figures released by the industry today, that share is now closer to 7.5%

Even Chrysler’s traditional rivals are doing well despite a harsh market. Nissan sold 55,393 light vehicles last month, down only 7% from a year ago. Toyota sold 126,015, down12.7% and now has sales which are about double Chrysler’s. Honda’s sales for the month were 77,229 cars and light trucks. The number was down 20%, but it means Honda was still very likely to have picked up share in the American market.

Chrysler sales are now running at the rate of 750,000 a year. It probably does not have the capital to wait through another year of low US car sales with a market share that is almost certainly to stay below 8%. It does not have models tailored to the current market tastes. Chrysler is going out of business. The company just hasn’t made it official.

Top Stocks blogger Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.

Related articles:

500 largest companies

IBM goes after Google

Unemployment worse than it seems

Volkswagen wants America

Kim Peterson — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 16:49:00 GMT

Volkswagen (VLKAF) wants more sales in the U.S., and will start building cars with more "American flavor," MSNBC.com reports.

That means bigger. And cheaper. VW is considering expanding into seven-passenger crossover SUVs in hopes of boosting its U.S. sales to 800,000 cars a year. Worldwide, Volkswagen wants to get to 10 million cars sold by 2018 (it sold 6.2 million last year).

Volkswagen is hoping that it will appeal more to people who buy Toyota Camrys and Honda Accords, reports Dan Carney.

Bing: Volkswagen fan clubs

It's also moving more car production to the U.S. It will build cars in a new plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., starting in 2011. That plant will be home to a mid-sized family sedan. Volkswagen is also planning a larger replacement for the Jetta.

Volkswagen has a small but enthusiastic fan base, but has found that its unusual features tend to confuse newcomers, MSNBC.com reports. So it's going to make some features feel a little more mainstream while trying to retain the unique VW feel.

And therein lies the dilemma. Can VW make its cars look like other cars without losing its current fans?

Volkswagen is also trying to overcome a reputation for poor quality and poor service at its dealerships. It says it's already fixing those problems.

Related reading:

Hedge funds consider suing Porsche

Is Ford doing everything right?

Toyota to become No. 1 car company in US

Toyota gains upper hand with Prius

Why investors should avoid Whole Foods

Minyanville — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 19:15:00 GMT

This article was written by Minyanville's Josh Lipton

This morning, longtime market pro Dennis Gartman weighed in with his views on the current Whole Foods boycott and controversy: “People who will go to a store wearing Birkenstocks and socks will take almost any outlandish position, and they’ve taken a position opposed to [CEO John Mackey’s] editorial in The Wall Street Journal last week that took Obamacare to task,” Gartman wrote. “When your own supporters are willing to abandon you, who will support you? It seems like a good question.”

In his outrage-provoking WSJ piece, Mackey called for a move toward “less government control and more individual empowerment” rather than “a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system.”

Bing: Whole Foods

Unsurprisingly, not all of Mackey’s Prius (TM)-driving customers agree with his views -- and some of those once-loyal, left-leaning patrons are now reportedly calling for a Whole Foods boycott on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.

Of course, Mackey's certainly managed to alienate them before: see CEOs Gone Wild: John Mackey for more. Investors should boycott Whole Foods shares, but not because of its stance on health care reform.

But the question isn't whether or not you should shop at Whole Foods (See, "Outpacing Whole Foods Means Not Charging Whole Paycheck." )-- it's whether or not you should dump the stock.

S&P equity analyst Joseph Agnese thinks you should avoid Whole Foods like a carton of spoiled milk. Agnese, who currently has a “Sell” rating on the company, says food retailer is now just looking too pricey, says the analyst.

“It is a great company but the valuation isn’t matching what the growth will be,” Agnese tells Minyanville.

Indeed, Whole Foods shares have surged 190% in the past 6 months, and it now looks expensive relative to its expected earnings power, with a price/earnings to growth ratio of 2.13. (Anything under one is considered a good deal.)

Looking ahead, Agnese sees problems for the company, as spendthrift consumers coming out of this recession save more and spend less, which will keep a lid on the sales growth at Whole Foods, he argues. In the third quarter, the food retailer said sales edged up 2% while sales at stores open at least a year slipped 2.5%.

“People aren’t trading up like they used to and they will be slow to return to that type of behavior,” the analyst says.

Where's the stock headed from here? Katie Stockton, chief market technician at MKM Partners, says Whole Foods is poised to fill its gap down to $24.87, at a minimum, as the market pulls back.

For those stock pickers that are still interested in playing with the grocers in general, Agnese does offer some suggestions. Broadly speaking, he likes those retailers targeting cheapskate shoppers such as Kroger (KR), which he rates a “Buy,” with a price target of $25.

“Those who differentiate to the higher end aren’t as well positioned as those who cater to more price-sensitive customers,” says the analyst.

And now those customers have another reason to avoid the overpriced organic foods lining the pristine shelves of their neighborhood Whole Foods: the CEO's politics.

Of course, boycotts are difficult to orchestrate and research analysts covering Whole Foods don’t see the threats as posing any kind of real cause for concern for the company. Frankly, it’s hard to see how these shoppers could really act on their political impulses: If they steer clear of Whole Foods (WFMI) altogether, where else can they go to buy all that organic applesauce?

No positions in stocks mentioned

Lean times are making Americans even fatter

Consumer Price Index primed for a fall

Eight reasons Kraft looks tastier than Whole Foods

Can GM stay No.1?

Douglas McIntyre — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 11:01:00 GMT

General Motors' new chairman, Edward E. Whitacre Jr., says one of his major goals is to make certain that the No. 1 U.S. car company stays No.1. GM will find it very hard to measure up.

In an exclusive interview with The Wall Street Journal, Whitacre said being No. 1 is “the position we should strive for… (as) an American company that employs hundreds of thousands of people…We just want to be No. 1.”

If wishes were horses, all the beggars would ride. GM is losing ground to the competition at an alarming rate. In July it sold 187,582 vehicles, down 20% from the same period a year ago. Toyota (TM) sold 174,872, down 11% and Ford (F) sold 158,354, up 2%. The spread between the top three manufacturers has become remarkably small.

GM has several hurdles to clear to keep its top spot. The first is that it will almost certainly lose share as it phases out or sells its Pontiac, Saturn, and Hummer brands. The number of nameplates that the company will offer falls well below Toyota.

GM has also lost ground in product development due to the company’s tremendous restructuring, layoffs, and bankruptcy. Ford now has the youngest fleet among the American car firms and it means to press that advantage by launching even more new vehicles over the next year.

It is entirely possible that GM could fall into the No. 3 spot in domestic cars sales as early as 2010, and Whitacre will end up looking foolish.

Top Stocks blogger Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.

Related stories:

Sony goes after Amazon

Buffett loses his chief pilot

Blackberry goes down market

Railroaded: one man's ride involves more than just delays

Minyanville — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 18:13:00 GMT

I can recite the 15 or so stops on New Jersey Transit’s North Jersey Coast Line in my sleep. I’ve made the trip from New York to Long Branch more often than I’d like to consider. My friends and I exchange NJT horror stories like trading cards -- though some are too depraved to divulge here.

A few of the milder occurrences: There’s the person who slides his smelly, shoeless feet directly through the seat cushion on which you’re sitting. There are the times you’ve fallen asleep and ended up utterly lost at the end of an unfamiliar line. The lone bottle that noisily rolls up and down the car with nobody bothering to stop it, the loud cell-phone talkers, the constant delays. And of course the merciless sonic blast of a conductor announcing stops at which nobody will exit on an early-morning train.

Worst of all, the train travels at a speed that’s the opposite of Mach 1. A century ago, the trip from New York to the Jersey Shore lasted about 2 hours. Now it’s only about 30 minutes faster, in spite of the benefits of modern technology.

New Jersey Transit isn’t some anomaly; instead, it's a fine example of the lowly position train travel occupies in this country.

I myself love traveling by train. And the few times I've done so in other countries reminds me that it ought to be central to life in a civilized country. It's also, in my mind, the most enjoyable and most sustainable mode of transportation. Which is why seeing how time has passed train travel by makes me rather sad.

Some may consider me anachronistic: My other 2 favorite pastimes -- watching horse racing and reading newspapers -- are in even sorrier shape. But recently I've acquired some reason to be hopeful. Trains may be rising from the ashes they've been left in since the dawn of the automobile age some 60 years ago.

The Obama Administration plans to give states $8 billion in stimulus funds to build a high-speed rail network. Because high-speed rail has been deemed a national priority, Congress will follow with another $1 billion annually for 5 years to pay for rail projects.

The timing is appropriate. With its political and financial bullying, General Motors helped gut America’s mass-transit system, starting a love affair with the automobile that began in the 1940s. Interstate highways were paved across the country, leaving few remnants of passenger rails.

But GM -- the train’s slayer a half-century ago -- is no more (at least as a private entity) -- and the American automobile industry, with its legacy of congestion, pollution, and sprawl, is reeling. And even Toyota (TM) and Honda (HMC) could be affected.

The administration’s initial investment seems to be a good start -- albeit a baby step, considering our country woefully lags all other Western nations. For instance, Japan is celebrating the forty-fifth anniversary of its first bullet train this year. Now they have dozens of them, each with an average speed of 165 miles per hour and a promptness that would make Amtrak blush. Spain’s Madrid-to-Seville train, for example, runs at 186 miles per hour. We don’t even have one high-speed line.

Some Japanese and European manufacturers that have extensive experience in the field may benefit from America’s new investments, such as Germany’s Siemens Transportation Systems Inc. (SI), which has a Sacramento plant that makes light-rail trains. Domestically, small rail-part companies like Harsco Corp. (HSC) and Portec Rail Products Inc. (PRPX) are in line, too.

The administration’s vision for high-speed rail lines is one of trains speeding through the wide-open spaces of the heartland. The loftiness of this vision aside, it doesn't agree with the geographic makeup of our country. Abetted by the automobile, we are -- unlike Japan or Europe -- a suburban and metropolitan population, not an urban one. In other words, few of us live and work near an area where a train might drop us a few steps away.

More so than fast trains, upgrading the current infrastructure is necessary, starting with Amtrak. We need better efficiency, more rail cars, and subsidies to encourage people to use public transportation. Instead of brand-new lines, existing ones should be expanded to reflect where people live in density.

In other words, the first step ought to be better New Jersey Transits -- and along with it, a more civilized riding experience. (One can hope.)

Right now, New Jersey Transit has begun work on a tunnel underneath the Hudson River -- the largest mass-transit project nationally. The number of trains per hour will double. And maybe, after 100 years, the train will finally arrive faster at its destination.

Top Stocks blogging partner Todd Harrison is founder & CEO of Minyanville.com. This post was written by Minyanville Contributor Ryan Goldberg.

Related Articles

Robot wars hit wall street

Big Pharma shoves America off the wagon

Whatever happened to the American suburb?

Danger ahead for 'new GM'

Douglas McIntyre — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 14:35:00 GMT

Updated at 5:09 p.m. ET

The “best” parts of General Motors were transferred Friday morning to a newly created company owned almost two-thirds by taxpayers. The federal government will end up stuffing $50 million into the new entity in the hope that a smaller and less debt-heavy GM can make money in the ravaged domestic car market.

Investors seemed to think so, and the announcement set up a bizarre day of trading in the stock that now represents GM, GMGMQ. It rose 37% during the day. Yet in the new world of GM, these shares are worthless, as Barron's explained in this report.They don't represent the new entity.

That new entity faces a difficult future.

GM will keep its Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, and GMC name plates and dump Pontiac, Hummer, Saab, and Saturn. Once that process is finished, GM may no longer be the largest car company in America. Its market share will probably be below 17%. Ford’s (F) is now above that level and Toyota (TM) is just behind at 15%.

GM has two problems that may make it a bad place to put taxpayer money. The first is that the American car market may never recover to the 16 million vehicles it sold four years ago. Annualized sales are running below 10 million in 2009. Americans have shown a tendency to keep cars longer. A change in the replacement cycle is a bad omen for consumer spending on cars and light trucks.

GM’s more difficult task it to market a much smaller product line against the likes of Toyota which now sells muscle cars, hybrids, sedans, coupes, and its luxury Lexus brand across a deal network that it has carefully built over the last three decades. Toyota has been merciless in competing with GM and has consistently taken sales from the company. It has a chance to deliver a coup de grace with its huge product line and a balance sheet that allows it to develop cars long-term and wait out the recession.

Top Stocks blogger Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.

Related articles:

Consumer sentiment dies

Bad times for Buffett

Ten green companies that aren't

Minyanville — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 17:58:00 GMT

One of the few commendable trends to emerge in the last few years has been the push to "go green." Tal Pinchevsky elaborates on this notion in a featured slideshow on Minyanville.com.

Between canvas bags and hybrid cars, consumers have made an effort to reduce, reuse and recycle -- even going so far as to equate "environmental" with "hip." While the movement could always use a little more steam, some self-professed "green" businesses have been polluting it with smog.

Companies synonymous with chemicals, crude oil and toxic waste are confronted with an unfavorable public image and diminishing returns. Since the change to cleaner technology and waste reduction can be a costly -- possibly unaffordable -- endeavor, PR reps have to concoct creative interpretations of their companies' production. Sometimes it's as small as adding a leaf to the logo or topping a bottle with a green cap. Other times, it's as egregious as fudging carbon dioxide emissions standards or referring to landfill clogs as "biodegradable."

The process is known as "Greenwashing."

And the shift to appear environmentally conscious has been unbelievably widespread. The supermarket shelf is filled with packages bearing images of children running through flowery meadows underneath blue skies and healthy oak trees. T. Boone Pickens hawks alternative power in front of giant wind turbines. Even the models on NBC's (GE) Deal or No Deal wore recycled parachutes in celebration of NBC's "Green Is Universal" campaign.

"100% Recyclable" is the new "50% Off."

Take the aforementioned NBC, for example. In celebration of their highly publicized Green Week, network programming incorporated various PR stunts to promote an environmental lifestyle. Contestants on "The Biggest Loser" vied for a hybrid SUV and a "Days of Our Lives" couple tied the knot in a fictional green wedding.

The actions during Green Week stood in stark contrast with Matt Lauer's equally-publicized event on "The Today Show." In his popular "Where in the World Is Matt Lauer?" annual segment, Lauer was whisked away to far-off locations such as Buenos Aires, Amsterdam, Laos, and Istanbul. And ditching the hot air balloon and bicycle for a private jet, NBC effectively threw their green image in the gutter using thousands of gallons of combustible fuel in the process.

Obviously, NBC is not alone.

Top Stocks blogging partner Todd Harrison is founder & CEO of Minyanville.com. This post was written by Minyanville Contributor Mike Schuster.

Related Articles

Who killed the hydrogen-powered car?

Ten hidden costs and the companies that hide them

Eight products you shouldn't try at home

Toyota gains upper hand with Prius

Douglas McIntyre — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 11:01:00 GMT

Toyota (TM) has booked 180,000 domestic orders for its latest Prius hybrid in the first month it has been on the market. There is no reason to think the car will not do extremely well in America. It is considered to be the best hybrid made by any car company and has sold well in the U.S. since it was first introduced.

With the third-generation Prius on its way to America, many of the auto plants of The Big Three are idle and the domestic manufacturers are hardly in a position to produce tens of thousand of hybrids during the rest of 2009. Even if they could, their products don’t have the reputation of the Prius.

The trouble that General Motors (GMGMQ) and Chryler will have fielding competitive products says a great deal about the problems with the government bailout. Even though the bankruptcies are moving quickly, the process of cutting billions of dollars of costs, closing plants, and shuttering dealerships will hurt the domestic industry as the economy begins what appears will be a slow recovery. GM and Chrysler might have been better prepared for the 2010 model year if the government had used its axe a little more slowly and kept a few more people on the job and idled fewer plants.

The push to make Detroit profitable overnight won’t work and it may well backfire. There is nothing wrong with losing money for a year or two if it is done based on strategic decisions to gain market share. The way GM and Chrysler are now structured, they will offer fewer brands and won’t have the kind of product development budgets which will allow them to put out large numbers of truly competitive, next-generation cars.

Detroit has cut to the bone just as some of Japan’s best products, with the Prius out in front, are about to attack the American market.

Top Stocks blogger Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.

Related articles:

Search enging wars

Exporting "green"

China shopping

Who killed the hydrogen-powered car?

Minyanville — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 14:29:00 GMT

In a perfect world, all energy would come from electricity and hydrogen. Wind, solar, tidal, geothermal, and other renewable energy sources would provide enough electricity to power everything except air transportation. The “conventional” answer to transportation in the future was the hydrogen fuel cell. It doesn’t get any better than that. The fuel cell burns hydrogen and powers cars, trucks, and any other transportation vehicle. The hydrogen combines with oxygen to form water vapor. No other gases or pollutants are released.

The hydrogen fuel cell is an efficient generator of electricity, but it has one major problem: It needs hydrogen. So where does it get it? Therein lies the hydrogen myth. On Earth, there's no hydrogen to mine. You have to make it, and that requires wasting energy. You could conceivably mine hydrogen from the sun or Jupiter, but even Al Gore would probably agree that that would be tough to accomplish.

Last month, the Department of Energy (DOE) finally conceded that hydrogen won't be a part of the near-term solution to global warming, the peak oil crisis, or anything else you can think of. They're cutting back funding dramatically on hydrogen research. This is a triumph of physics over policy. In the long run, physics will always win, but we have way too many policy wonks in Washington without a clue about how the physical world works.

Even if hydrogen could be produced cheaply, it has another problem that makes it impractical as a fuel for transportation. Even when highly compressed, the energy density per liter or gallon is very low compared to gasoline or diesel fuel. Think about the size of the fuel tanks on the trucks that deliver gasoline to a station compared to the size of the tank on the truck. The ratio is about 90 to 1. That’s an efficient delivery system. If a hydrogen delivery truck had to burn hydrogen, the size of the fuel tank for the engine would be about one-quarter of the size of the delivery tank! Energy density or transportation problems didn’t kill hydrogen. What killed it is the deliverable amount of energy to the wheels of a vehicle compared to a battery solution. This is why we won't be seeing hydrogen-powered cars from Toyota (TM), Honda (HMC), or Ford (F).

The table below needs a little explanation. It starts with 100 kilowatts of electricity from renewable sources -- solar or wind for example. It then compares the steps required to get the electrical energy stored on a vehicle as either hydrogen or batteries. During each step, energy is lost -- generally as heat -- until electric power is driving the electric motors on a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle or a battery-powered vehicle. Each step shows the percentage efficiency and the remaining energy left after each step.

This table used data from an article published by Ulf Bossel entitled, "Does a Hydrogen Economy Make Sense?" in Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol. 94, No. 10, October 2006. You can argue all you want about the exact percentages used in each step, but the result won't be much different. A battery-powered vehicle will be close to 3 times as efficient as a hydrogen- powered fuel cell vehicle.

The DOE got it right.

If the one word back in the 1967 movie The Graduate was “plastics," the word for the future will be “batteries,” with the possible addition of “ultracaps." I’ll discuss batteries and a potential “ultracap play” in a follow-up article.

Top Stocks blogging partner Todd Harrison is founder & CEO of Minyanville.com. This post was written by Minyanville Contributor James Anderson.

Related Articles

The road to hell is paved with good incentives

GM tails Chrysler into bankruptcy

Why commercial real estate can't be saved