March 10, 2007: Aero defense and commercial air tidbits

House Democrats are scrambling to appease the far left fringe of their Party and begin to assemble a bill to provide exit strategy from Iraq before a satisfactory resolution is obtained. Cut and Run, Inc.

AH received a $40.7M contract from FRPT (Force Protection) for production of the Cougar armored vehicle as part of the USMC WRAP program. All work in '07.

China is reported to increase military spending by at least 18% annually. DoD expert's look on this as an almost 30% increase military hardware. Almost all is offensive-capable.

ESL beat the street earnings estimate by a notch.

Airbus announced losses of E768M compared to looses of E450M last year. It expects substantial losses this year.

Shanghai Airlines selected GR (Goodrich) electric braking systems for its new Boeing 787s.

Tactical Wheeled Vehicles for the armed forces were analysed and it appears that the Humvees have approximately 81% of useful life remaining, Medium trucks have approximately 20% useful life remaining and Heavy trucks have approximately 38% useful life remaining. This bodes well for Oshkosh (OSK) which produces a good number of trucks for the armed forces.

STOCKS TO WATCH:

BE Aerospace (BEAV)
Goodrich (GR)
Precision Castparts (PCP)
Spirit Aero Systems (SPR)-recently added to my list
Trans Digm Group (TGD) - newly added to my list
Boeing (BA)
Esterline Tech (ESL)
Armor Holdings (AH)
DynCorp (DYN)
General Dynamics (GD)
Lockheed Martin (LMT)
Northrup Grumman (NOC) - a strike at a NOC shipyard does not appear significant
Oshkosh (OSK)

Personal congratulations to four recently promoted Captains and Major in the USAF, and a battle-tested USCG Lt. Anonymous you will remain.