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Strategies & Market Trends : Value Investing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Cautious_Optimist who wrote (54750)	1/7/2015 1:29:33 PM
From: Paul Senior	1 Recommendation Recommended By Jurgis Bekepuris Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 78628

Ford/auto manufacturers: What is the strategic (competitive picture, distribution strength etc.) advantage going forward? I see great value at this market cap. I see a company that will survive short term storms. I see a strategic GLOBAL transportation marketplace which will be seeing colossal innovation in the next 25 years with tech M&A people giving an additional push. I don't see any real advantage that would be sustainable that Ford has over the other auto manufacturers. New products are copied. Technology is copied. The dealership issues are common I'd guess. Toyota might still have an advantage with its fabled Toyota Production System. I'm not sure any company has competitive strength regarding quality anymore: Ford has MyTouch problems, Honda maybe a bit more than others with airbags. Quality/reliability of cars (excluding software/telecom stuff) seems to be, if not equivalent, close enough to where poor quality is not a deal killer. I see no reason to buy F stock based on strategic advantage. If anybody were to buy a new Ford car/truck though, they might do well to have held F stock for a year: you become eligible for a Ford discount price as a shareholder. I continue to hold a package of car manufacturer stocks because I expect truck/car sales to continue to do well. I don't see any outstanding buys at current price. I have added a bit though to VLKAY because it looks a little better than some of the others in the sector based on p/e, and it's a stock I've held and followed for a while. My preference is still for the auto retailers and auto loan companies. All jmo, and I've been wrong many, many times.