Road Runner

Readers Pick the Top 20 5-Year Horizon Stocks

TheHague, Don't lose faith in Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart hasn't performed this year simply because it is considered a "defensive stock”, a safe place to put money during tough economic times. Well, during 2009, money shifted out of defensive stocks into potential high growth stocks as the threat of economic catastrophe abated. It has little to do with how Wal-Mart, as a company, is performing. It’s just natural stock rotation.


On Oct 18 09:18 PM TheHague wrote:
> WMT? Nice try! I just sold my shares that I bought in March! I can
> now buy into them cheaper than they were when I bought them! I gave
> up! Their last Div. was not that great! I tried to believe, but some
> thing is not right there! I don't know what it is but it ain't cool!

Readers Pick the Top 20 5-Year Horizon Stocks

I'm impressed by the quality of this list, and how it reached down into some stocks that I didn't think were in the minds of the general investor community, like AONE and BYDDY.PK. Plus, it listed stocks that are truly (not stuck-in-the-mud like Microsoft and Yahoo) innovative companies that are “pushing the envelope” on the technology front like GE with green technology, like Google with search, operating system, and “cloud computing” technology, and like Apple with mobile Internet technology.

A123 Systems (AONE) and BYD of China (BYDDY.PK) are head-to-head competitors in the plug-in vehicle battery market. They both make the Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP or LiFePO4) battery which, when the manufacturing is perfected, will be the ideal battery for vehicles, in my opinion. These are the clearly, in my opinion, the leaders in the quickly emerging LFP battery market. A123 seems to be the high quality player, and BYD seems to be the high quantity player. BYD is an established player with non-LFP batteries so it is well established and profitable. A123 is a startup with only one product – its LFP battery. I see investing in A123 as very speculative but potentially very profitable.

As a side note, if Japan wants to pull itself out of its 2 decade economic stagnation, one of the best things it could do is let Wal-Mart “run wild” in its country. Japan’s retail system is very inefficient. There is a lot of job protection going on. Wal-Mart would cause many jobs to be lost, but it would spur economic growth via a much more efficient retail system that would deliver goods to its citizens at a much lower price. This would leave money left over in people’s pockets that would lead to a higher consumption of other products increasing the economy.

MidAmerican Energy, BYD Partner on Battery Storage Initiative

HaavBline, there is no need to have a quick battery replacement station with the Lithium Iron Phosphate battery. Another one of its revolutionary characteristics is that it can be recharged very quickly. BYD says its battery can be recharged to 50% in 10 minutes. Wow!

If you want to read some fun blogs about how fast this battery can be recharged, read some of the RC (radio controlled) airplane blogs. Some of these guys are pushing the limit on these batteries just to see what they can do. So far, I've read nothing but amazement and praise.

The only real issue with the Lithium Iron Phosphate battery for vehicles is price and availability. Both are a function of manufacturing scale and innovation.

MidAmerican Energy, BYD Partner on Battery Storage Initiative

Alan Young, BYD is a Li-ion battery specialist in the established Lithium Cobalt technology which is what is used in laptops and cell phone. But, they are also heavy into the new Lithium Iron Phosphate battery technology that will go into vehicles. This new technology is much safer and lasts much longer than Lithium Cobalt batteries. These 2 technologies should not be grouped together under the "Li-ion" title, like so many articles do, because they are so different.

In response to your last remark. I believe the Lithium Iron Phosphate battery technology is “spectacularly disruptive” in the long term, but not now. It has the potential to be low cost (no expensive Cobalt) along with being high energy, high power, long life, extremely safe, easy to charge, very fast charge rate, no venting so can be put under the back seat of a car, etc. But, this revolution will take many years, maybe like 10 years or more. It will take huge amounts of capital and time to build up the manufacturing capacity, and make the incremental technology and manufacturing improvements to bring down the cost.

That is why I am amazed, like yourself, of why BYD is pursuing the power infrastructure market at this time. This new battery is perfect for vehicles, but is probably not the cost effective battery for the alternative energy infrastructure at this time because it is going to be many years for the cost to decrease sufficiently.

MidAmerican Energy, BYD Partner on Battery Storage Initiative

I agree with MidAmerican Energy’s Chairman David Sokol. I don't think he is being contradictive in opposing cap-and-trade while pushing forward with alternative energy. There are other ways to promote wind and solar without cap-and-trade, like the current system of tax incentives and mandates on power companies. Cap-and-trade would be an unnecessary added tax on the consumer.

MidAmerican Energy, BYD Partner on Battery Storage Initiative

BYD is amazingly aggressive. Not only are they going after the vehicle market with their revolutionary new battery, but also the alternate energy market. Both are giant markets. I would think that the vehicle market would be enough to keep them overwhelmed with orders and keep them expanding factory capacity at a breakneck pace. Maybe their manufacturing style of low automation and high people count allows them to expand quickly. Maybe BYD can prove wrong the battery world conventional wisdom that battery production must be highly automated to ensure quality. We'll see.

Strong Work Ethic at BYD, Maker of Electric Cars

The Chinese are scary!

This live-for-your-job work ethic of the current day Chinese is similar to the Japanese after World War II. Their self-sacrificing fervor to rebuild Japan after the war drove them to create the world's second largest economy. It seems like the capitalistic, post "workers paradise" communism (an oxymoron) in China is having the same effect. Eventually this live-for-your-job work ethic will subside in China just like it has in Japan.