3SOF

Got my gold. They say it is oil and gold. And only american dollars are slipping. Rest of the world oil is not going up, just america's.

Went below 2.00 today.

After Hours: 1.78 -0.01 (-0.56%)  -  Mar 14, 7:56PM ET

The bottom? With bankruptcy still in the picture I think this will test .50 like Lucent did.

FRPT did test .50 once, after it did the 11 to 1 RS brought it to 2.00 to begin with.

Will the company still be in business? Most people ILS or vehicle support for as long as they are deployed and retained in inventory. They are still the vehicle of choice by the Marines.

Also there is a long lead contract for 180 Buffaloes for the MMPV GSMTIDS escort vehicles.

The Buffalo is the sole Cat I MRAP vehicle by any manufacturer.


Why it went below 2.00 today.


BAE, Navistar Truck Orders Shut Out Force Protection (Update2)

By Edmond Lococo

March 14 (Bloomberg) -- BAE Systems Plc and Navistar International Corp. won 99 percent of a $1.1 billion Pentagon order for blast-resistant trucks, all but shutting out Force Protection Inc. in a decision that surprised analysts.

Force Protection won just 29 of the 2,243 vehicles ordered today for delivery by November, the Defense Department said in a statement today after the close of U.S. markets. London-based BAE received orders for 1,471, almost two-thirds of the total. Earlier awards have been split more evenly between the three.

``This is pretty bad news for Force Protection,'' said Tim Quillin, an analyst with Stephens Inc. in Little Rock, Arkansas, who rates Force Protection shares ``equal weight'' and doesn't own any. ``I'm surprised they were almost completely shut out of this round of orders.''

The trucks, used to protect troops from roadside bombs in Iraq, have blast-deflecting V-shaped hulls that are four times safer than flat-bottomed transports. Today's orders add to the 11,891 Mine-Resistant, Ambush-Protected vehicles, or MRAPs, previously purchased and don't yet fulfill the Defense Department's plan announced in September to buy 15,274.

Ladson, South Carolina-based Force Protection's awards were valued at $17.5 million. Its shares fell 26 percent today, the most since Dec. 12, before the order was announced. The stock dropped 62 cents to $1.79 in Nasdaq Stock Market trading, below its May peak of $31.16.

Warrensville, Illinois-based Navistar was unchanged at $56.75, and BAE earlier rose 2.75 pence to 486.75 in London.

Order Values

BAE's order was valued at $715.9 million, including orders placed with its Armor Holdings unit, which was acquired in July for $4.53 billion. Navistar's order was for 743 trucks valued at $410.7 million.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates made MRAP vehicles the highest priority acquisition program in May to improve troop safety. In November, the U.S. Marine Corps began reducing requirements for the vehicles, saying they lacked the ``maneuverability and mobility'' that is needed ``to pursue the enemy off-road, in confined areas or across many bridges.''

At 17 tons, Force Protection's Cougar truck built for the program weighs more than three of the M1151 armored Humvees built by AM General LLC. The company builds the Cougar in a joint venture with Falls Church, Virginia-based General Dynamics Corp.

Today's orders were mainly for the U.S. Army, which announced in December it planned to focus on purchases of the BAE and Navistar vehicles, said Michael Aldrich, Force Protection's vice president for government relations.

``This is the logical continuation of the course the Army set back in December,'' Aldrich said in an interview after the decision. ``From December we stopped ramping up because they don't need it currently.''

The Marine Corps and the Army are now planning a contest for June to purchase a new truck called the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle, which is intended to offer better protection than the current fleet of Humvee transports, while being more mobile than MRAPs.

To contact the reporters on this story: Edmond Lococo in Boston at [email protected].

Last Updated: March 14, 2008 19:44 EDT

GDX says sideways with continuing uptrend.

DRYS is investing its money other than itself, meaning it does not have growth coming and/or what they do see coming means their time and money would be better spent elsewhere. Basically it believes in itself less for some reason.

Hi,

Been a bull and a cheerleader here. Sold in December for a loss of 52% for the year. But it started a 10 bagger for the year so I have no complaint.

The president of FRPT has been replaced by an investment banker. Clue of what this company is worth before bankruptcy.

For closure here there is only one milestone between here and bankruptcy. Roxboro and Cheetah. It is still in for next generation MRAP II testing after modifications with production delayed until Q2 with no contracts. With the delay Roxboro now has a rated production capacity of 750 vehicles in 2008, all which could still be MRAP II and foreign contracts. But again no word from the pipeline about "firm" interest.

Production is slated to end May-July with one more contract budgeted for the spring. But FRPT is third on the list behind favored IMG and BAE who have a much longer performance history with DoD than FRPT, a DoD contract policy of "past performance by contractor" status.  Something the one vehicle "Cougar" wonder does not have. It was a Marine favorite and has not earned an Army nod because Army standards for long term sustainability and life cycle were not designed into Cougar. These standards are defacto standards at the Army that the Marines overlooked because of their urgent need at the time. So between the competition and money being diverted to MRAP II vehicles the possability of not another contract in the spring is in the cards.

The near fatal blow is BAE won as the sole source contractor for MMPV, where Cougar and Cheetah were in the running. This is the long term multi-billion dollar contract for vehicles to be retained in inventory to do basically what the Cougar and Buffalo were urgently rushed to Iraq and Afghanistan.

MMPV was an FRPT future which is now BAE's.

The US Army's MMPV EOD/Engineer Vehicles
10-Jan-2008 20:02 | Permanent Link
Related stories: Contracts - Awards, Americas - USA, Trucks & Transport, BAE, Transformation

RG-33L
(click to view full)At the beginning of June 2007, BAE sat in 4th place in the US MRAP competition with orders for just 90 vehicles – 2.8% of the total. It had to be a humbling experience for the firm that went into 2004 as the world leader in the field. The climb back has been slow and consistent, involving a major $4+ billion acquisition and a slow ramp-up of orders for its flagship RG-33 family of vehicles, which built on BAE OMC's 4 decades of experience in blast-resistant vehicles in South Africa. By December 2007, BAE had reached second place in the MRAP production race with 3,569 direct orders, plus some orders via General Dynamics' entry of BAE OMC's earlier RG-31 model. In January 2007, the firm made its comeback complete, regaining its spot as the leader in the field.

The total $2.288 billion MMPV program will buy up to 2,500 vehicles for use by U.S. Army Engineers and Explosive Ordnance Disposal teams through 2015. U.S. Army engineers will use to conduct route and area clearance missions, command and control, mount mine clearing systems, and conduct explosive hazards reconnaissance. MMPVs will also be used by Explosive Ordnance Disposal teams to neutralize Improvised Explosive Devices, mines and other unexploded ordnance. BAE has just been picked as the sole-source winner...

Contracts & Key Events


Travel position
(click to view full)Jan 9/08: BAE Systems announces that it has been selected by the U.S. Army to be the sole producer of the new Medium Mine Protected Vehicle (MMPV), based on their 6×6 RG-33L design. The firm has been awarded an initial $20 million delivery order for 9 MMPV test vehicles, test support, armor testing packages, and vehicle basic issue items such as first-aid kits and repair tools, training, various contract data et. al. are due for delivery between May – August 2008.

Under a strategic Public/Private Partnership Agreement, BAE Systems and the Letterkenny Army Depot (LAD), PA will perform automotive and final assembly production operations of these vehicles in facilities on and adjacent to the LAD facilities.

I keep hoping for a turnaround too. But the reality is this is still heading downward. The next good news will be a contract in the spring. Anything else better be any good news. Because current backlog dictates current production ends in May, June, or July. And that expansion plan below just keeps bleeding the profits with no contracts.


Force Protection Slows Cheetah Production Schedule (Update2)
2008-01-04 14:17 (New York)


     (Adds analyst comment in the fourth paragraph.)

By Edmond Lococo
     Jan. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Force Protection Inc., the largest
supplier of blast-resistant trucks to the U.S. Marine Corps,
plans a slower production schedule for its new Cheetah vehicles
as the company gauges sales opportunities.
     Force Protection plans to start building the trucks by the
end of March at a new plant, which will have monthly capacity
for 200 by the end of 2008, Michael Aldrich, vice president for
government relations, said in an interview today. That's a
``much longer ramp-up'' than originally planned, he said.
     The company hasn't received any Cheetah orders and will
initially build between 50 and 100 for demonstration, he said.
The original plan was to build 70 to 90 of the trucks starting
in the fourth quarter of 2007. At the time of that July
announcement, Aldrich said the intention was to build the
Cheetah without orders, in advance of demand, ``like Detroit
puts out a new car.'' That has changed, he said today.
     ``They are backing off the `Field of Dreams' strategy a
little because they haven't had any orders yet,'' said Timothy
Quillin, an analyst with Stephens Inc. in Little Rock, Arkansas,
who rates Force Protection shares ``underweight'' and doesn't
own any. ``Even building 50 to 100 demo models seems excessive
to me. It might be prudent to wait for orders.''
     Force Protection, based in Ladson, South Carolina, fell 32
cents, or 6.4 percent, to $4.69 at 1:45 p.m. in Nasdaq Stock
Market composite trading. The stock has dropped 85 percent from
the record close of $30.27 on May 30.
     The slowdown follows the decision last month by the U.K.
Ministry of Defence to purchase a truck based on the company's
existing Cougar vehicle instead of the Cheetah, Aldrich said.
The Pentagon said Dec. 17 Force Protection may sell the U.K. 170
trucks, which would be valued at as much as $147 million.

                          More Prudent

     The Cheetah was in the running for the U.K. order and that
was the best prospect for a quick sale of the new truck, Aldrich
said. While there remain opportunities to sell the Cheetah in
the U.S. and to allied nations, none of those orders is likely
to come in the next 30 days, Aldrich said. He didn't identify
any potential buyers.
     ``We're taking a more financially prudent approach to
Cheetah production,'' Aldrich said. ``The acceleration will be
gauged on near-term sale opportunities.''
     Force Protection bought a 430,000 square foot building in
Roxboro, North Carolina, for $3.5 million in July, and plans to
spend a total of about $50 million to equip the new facility to
build Cheetah trucks, the company said in a Nov. 13 regulatory
filing. About $10 million was spent through Sept. 30. Force
Protection may need to issue new stock or debt early this year
to fund the expansion, the filing said.

                     `Cheetah is Everything'

     The Cheetah is crucial to Force Protection's efforts to
maintain growth because the U.S. military is cutting back
purchases of some of the larger, heavier trucks it bought to
protect troops from roadside bombs in Iraq as part of the Mine-
Resistant, Ambush-Protected vehicle, or MRAP, program, Quillin
said.
     As the war boosted demand, Force Protection ramped up
monthly output of its existing Cougar and Buffalo vehicles more
than sixfold in the past year, to 350 last month, from 55 in
December 2006. It teamed with Falls Church, Virginia-based
General Dynamics Corp. to boost Cougar output.
     The Marine Corps in November said it would cut by 38
percent planned MRAP purchases to 2,300 trucks from 3,700. The
reduction was in response to both reduced violence in Iraq, and
because of the need for greater vehicle mobility.
     At 8 tons, the Cheetah is less than half the weight of the
17-ton Cougar. The Cheetah has a cruising speed of 80 miles per
hour, compared with 55 miles per hour for the Cougar.
     ``Cheetah is everything,'' Quillin said. ``The key for this
company is establishing a long-term, sustainable revenue base,
which is going to be largely related to their success with
Cheetah.''

--Editor: Will Daley, John Lear

Two long term obstacles. Both about future contracts beyond this spring.

MRAP II which will be the new standard in MRAPs thereafter. Only Ceradyne, and BAE have passed into pre-production testing and contracted with 6 full test prototypes. This initial contract includes options on LRIP production contracts upon completion of testing on pre-production prototypes submitted.

FRPT is still in the running with the Cheetah as "a competitive range bid" which will be looked at and worked with. But it did not pass blast testing which is why it is not with Ceradyne and BAE in MRAP II contracts. The other MRAP II candidate Cougar was being criticised for its apparent failure to meet Army standards in Sustainability and Life Cycle costs, a major requirement by the army with contracts of this size. In short the Army has placed it in third place which may be no place with the Army. For not doing it the Army way. Also, why no MRAP II contracts for full testing?

Foreign contracts seem to be less than 1000 vehicles and whether FRPT gets any or all of them is doubtful.

I think this may be a broken company because the competition keeps taking the lead, leaving FRPT following left with what?

There is a reality to this.

FRPT got a small percentage of this 4 way split placing FRPT behind IMG and BAE, leaving FRPT in third place.

So with the Army purchasing the remaining vehicles FRPT's months are numbered, with this backlog May exactly. Of course there is one additional order scheduled for the spring to keep production open if necessary. Plus rumored international orders for hundreds of more vehicles.

FRPT's secret was the Marines bought every vehicle FRPT could make, not the Army which will be the only buyer from now on.

A criticism filtered down from the Army.

we intend to continue working with the Army to field the Cougar vehicle in a way that will meet the Army's objective of reducing sustainment and life cycle expense," said Gordon McGilton, CEO of Force Protection, Inc.

Stock drops after DRYS announces it wants to get into the oil business.

If these are all of the December contracts FRPT just died, 4 in afterhours on heavy volume.


AP
Pentagon Buys 3,000 Armored Vehicles
Tuesday December 18, 6:09 pm ET
By Donna Borak, AP Business Writer

Pentagon Orders 3,000 Armored Vehicles From Four Suppliers

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon on Tuesday awarded a combined $2.66 billion deal to four manufacturers to build and deliver more than 3,000 bomb-resistant armored vehicles for U.S. soldiers in Iraq.
The winning vendors include Warrenville, Ill.-based Navistar International Corp., a subsidiary of International Military and Government LLC; Ladson, S.C.-based Force Protection Industries Inc., the North American subsidiary of British defense conglomerate BAE Systems Plc and Stewart & Stevenson Tactical Vehicle, a division of Armor Holdings Inc., which was acquired by BAE.

The orders included a $1.18 billion deal with Navistar International Corp. for 1,500 vehicles, a $377.8 million deal with Force Protection Industries Inc. for 358 vehicles, a $645.4 million deal with BAE Systems Inc. for 600 vehicles and a $458.1 million deal with Stewart & Stevenson Tactical Vehicle for 668 vehicles.

The latest order exceeds the $1.2 billion deal awarded in October to Force Protection, BAE Systems Inc. and Navistar to build and deliver 2,400 armored vehicles.

To date, the Pentagon has ordered nearly 12,000 vehicles from manufacturers.

The new vehicles will be delivered between June and July 2008, according to the Pentagon.

Wall Street analysts have expected an order of more than 3,000 mine-resistant, ambush-protected, or MRAP, vehicles to be distributed among Force Protection Inc., BAE Systems Inc. and Navistar International.

Force Protection's stock has been battered in recent weeks on concerns that the armored-vehicle maker would receive smaller-than-expected contracts from the U.S. military.

Also fueling fears are the Marines Corps' plans to reduce its requirement of the armored vehicle to 2,400 from the planned 3,700. And while senior Army officials have yet to revise their current strategy to purchase less than 10,000 vehicles, some adjustment is expected.

Shares of Force Protection fell $1.23, or 21.8 percent, to $4.64 in extended-trading, after falling 5 cents to close at $5.91.

Shares of Navistar fell $1.65, or 3.2 percent, to close at $50.05.

Reversal in progress. 29% gain so far.

Going down for the third time. The Army weighs in for cutbacks and the Marines formally request their cut in vehicles from the JROC which has the final oversight.

Interim December contracts have been cut from 6500 to 3200. With Gates saying the cuts will be seen in March. Meaning they must complete their short term evaluation of current operational needs and get formal approval from JROC. The JROC also approved of the current 15000 vehicles.

So do we bet at picking the bottom and gamble on December contracts?

Or pick this back up at Penny Stock Picking?

Currently 5.80.

Chartist reality. There is a 10% chance this downtrend is supposed to happen by

http://www.stockconsultant.com/consultnow/basicplus.cgi?symbol=FRPT#ttop

Probability - Excessive Down trend (1 month), not sustainable, occurs only 10% of the time, expect trend to turn sideways or higher.

The management reality has changed significantly in the last week. Total market is being adjusted downward from 15,000 vehicles. The army next must plan its reduction from 10000 of that 15000. EPS was based on 30% share of total market which has decreased pending official announcement.

So there is a possability that the second production plant which has yet to get a contract may not get one as the required number falls.

The good news of December contracts will only be for an increment of production beyond the present contracted through March. Meaning this business plan could end before the end of the year without reaching maximum or peak production estimates.

The expansion plan will be in negative cash flow if the December contracts are not large enough to provide operating and expansion cash after the first of the year. The rumored stock dilution and the beginning of this decline at the Q3 report where it was announced. Will the expansion pay for itself or be taken out of profits?

?

12.50 and 15.00 call options went on sale on heavy volume. Price recovery at upside resistance at 15.50 or a complete bust?

Good news December contracts are coming. Bad news not as much as previously estimated.


U.S. to Buy 3,200 Blast-Resistant Trucks, Pentagon's Young Says
2007-12-03 13:16 (New York)


By Tony Capaccio
    Dec. 3 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. military plans to order more
than 3,200 blast-resistant armored trucks within weeks and may
place bookings for the same amount in March, the Pentagon's top
acquisition official said.

   The orders by mid-December would add to 8,815 Mine-
Resistant, Ambush-Protected vehicles already on contract,
Undersecretary for Acquisition John Young said today in an
interview at the Pentagon. The orders are part of a $24.5 billion
program that eventually would produce more than 15,000 vehicles.

    The new batch is being funded with $11.6 billion contained
in a $471.2 billion spending bill for fiscal 2008 that Congress
passed last month and President George W. Bush signed into law.
The pending orders are not affected by a Marine Corps proposal
disclosed Nov. 30 that would allow the military branch to cut its
earlier requirement of 3,700 vehicles by 1,400, Young said.

    Defense Secretary Robert Gates asked commanders ``to make
absolutely certain the recommendation fits the strategy for the
whole theater,'' Young said. ``If there are changes, that will
come forward to us in our orders, but right now I don't think any
of that will change in December. The only thing that might change
is March'' if the overall requirement is reduced.

    Navistar International Corp., Force Protection Inc., and BAE
Systems PLC each won an order in October to build more blast-
resistant trucks for the U.S. military, work that has a combined
value of $1.21 billion. Force Protection fell Nov. 30 by 28
percent, the most in more than four years in Nasdaq Stock Market
trading, after the Marine Corps said it wants to cut purchases.

    The Pentagon has a requirement for 15,274 MRAP vehicles, a
12-fold increase from its initial request in July 2006. So far,
8,815 trucks have been ordered, including 2,226 for the Marines.

Editor: Kevin Miller, Will Daley

To contact the reporters on this story:
Tony Capaccio at +1-202-624-1911 or [email protected]