Earlier in the week we looked at what Intermodel freight transport means. The following is a short video explaining the intermodal freight system in the U.S.:
Source: AAR
Related:
The Top 10 Heavy Equipment Manufacturers in the World
Heavy Equipments such as bulldozers, excavators, loader, etc. are used in many industries but primarily in Construction and Mining. The following infographic shows The Top 10 Global Manufacturers of these Heavy Equipments.
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Source: Market Research Reports
Tickers of above companies on the US markets (if available):
- Caterpillar (CAT)
- Komatsu (KMTUY)
- Hitachi Construction Machinery (HTCMY)
- Volvo Construction Equipment
- Liebherr
- XCMG
- Doosan Infracore
- Sany
- John Deere (JD)
- JCB
Disclosure: No Positions
India is Far More Diversified Than Other Emerging Equity Markets
One of the issues with investing in emerging markets is that some of them are concentrated with certain sectors accounting for a large weightage than others. For instance, the Russian market is over weight in energy primarily crude oil. Taiwan is heavy in the tech sector such as semiconductors and hardware. Financials dominate the equity markets of Brazil, Indonesia and Malaysia. Compared to most emerging markets, the Indian stock market is much more diversified according to an article by Nimesh Chandan at Robeco.
The following chart shows the sector weights of major emerging markets based on the MSCI index of the respective countries:
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Source: Why diversity and demographics favor investing in India, Robeco
Though financials account for the largest weightage in the MSCI India index, other sectors are more represented well in the index.
Below is an short excerpt from the above article:
The subcontinent is often overlooked in favor of its higher profile neighbor, China. Yet India offers much more choice in its investible sectors, an increasingly wealthy consumer, and demographics that China can only dream of.
The number of middle-class people with disposable income to spend on an increasing array of consumer goods – the bedrock of any growing economy – is about 350 million, or higher than the entire EU. It was once said that India has almost as many deities as languages (over 100), and such diversity is also reflected in its equity market.
“India is probably the most diversified among all the emerging markets in terms of the number of sectors contributing to the index,” says Nimesh Chandan, portfolio manager of the Robeco Indian Equities fund.
“Large sectors such as pharmaceuticals, consumer staples and telecoms contribute to index earnings, and these have been relatively immune (or less affected) during the Covid-19 pandemic.”
“That has given comfort to earnings: in fact, in the second quarter, Indian companies outperformed analysts’ earnings expectations by 10 percentage points. So, it seems like we are through the worst of the slowdown induced by the pandemic, and are looking for better opportunities and better times ahead.”
The complete article is worth a read.
For investors looking to invest in India, a few ADRs trade on the US markets. Another option is to go with ETFs the list of which can be found here.
Annual Installations of Industrial Robots by Country 2019
According to the World Robotics 2020 Industrial Robots report, currently there are 2.7 million industrial robots in operation in factories around the world. This figure is an crease of 12% relative to 2019 when 373,000 units were shipped global.
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Source: IFR presents World Robotics Report 2020
China is the largest market for industrial robots with about 783,000 units in operation last year. The majority of the robots in China were shipped by foreign suppliers. Japan is the second major market followed by the US. The US has 293.200 robots in operation.
What is Intermodal: Infographic
Intermodal freight transport means movement of freight in a container using multiple multiple methods of transportation such as trucks, trains, ships, barges, etc. without any handling of the freight itself when the mode of transportation changes. This process reduces unnecessary handling, risk and of course if the most efficient. In simple terms, this means a factory loading all the widgets for example into a container and then a truck carrying the container to a rail yard where it is loaded onto a train. Then the train offloads the container in a port where it loaded again onto a ship for delivery across the world. The container that was first packed in the factory is never opened during this process until it reaches it final destination.
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Source: American Association of Railroads(AAR)
Related stocks:
- Canadian National Railway Co (CNI)
- Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd(CP)
- CSX Corp (CSX)
- Kansas City Southern (KSU)
- Union Pacific(UNP)
- Norfolk Southern Corp(NSC)
Disclosure: Long CSX, CNI and UNP