Growing energy needs, a beaten-down valuation, and clean energy solutions have made Plug Power a hot stock to own this year.
A couple of years ago, things looked dire for Plug Power (PLUG 3.42%) stock. It was plunging in value and it even issued a going concern warning, which means that the business was concerned about its finances and that there were significant doubts about its ability to continue operating.
The company says that risk no longer exists. And not only are its financials stronger, but the energy stock has also been red hot of late. This year, share prices of the hydrogen company are up an incredible 95%. In just the past six months, its stock price has more than tripled in value.
Has this once-risky stock become a good, safe option for investors?
Image source: Getty Images.
Energy has been a big investing theme this year, largely due to artificial intelligence (AI) and the need to power up large data centers. Plug Power has positioned itself as one of the leading companies in offering clean energy solutions with hydrogen fuel cells. Many investors likely see the zero-emission energy options that Plug Power offers as one of several potential solutions to rising energy needs in AI.
The more that tech companies invest in AI data centers, the greater the need may be for energy in the future. And it’s that potential growth that has many investors willing to look past Plug Power’s lack of profitability and shortcomings today — but doing so could be a perilous mistake.
Plug Power may have removed the near-term going concern warning last year, but I have doubts about the company’s ability to survive in the long run. This is, after all, still a massive, cash-burning business. In the past six months, it has incurred net losses totaling $425.6 million, which was more than the revenue it generated over that time frame ($307.6 million). The business’s cost of sales was even higher at $435 million, resulting in negative margins and a loss before even factoring in overhead and other operating expenses.
It also burned through $297 million in cash over the course of its day-to-day operating activities during the past two quarters. Without a path to profitability or positive cash flow in the foreseeable future, there is plenty of risk for dilution and frequent share offerings in the stock’s future.
Investing in hydrogen energy is a long-term play, and it’s one that’s full of risks. While hydrogen can play an important role in addressing the world’s global energy needs, not everyone is convinced that it will be the case. Some critics point to the inefficiency and high costs that come with hydrogen energy production. And there are alternative energy sources that may be cleaner and better options in the long run.
It’s easy to get swept up in the AI-driver energy hype, and that’s what may be happening with Plug Power. But that doesn’t mean this is a safe stock to invest in. For a while, this stock was going nowhere but down; it declined by more than 50% in each of the past three years. Then, the energy stock craze took off, and so did Plug Power’s valuation.
While it may look like a cheap stock to own given its massive decline in recent years and the fact that it’s trading at just 4 times its trailing revenue, this is still a highly risky investment to hold in your portfolio. Until and unless its fundamentals drastically improve, you’re likely better off avoiding Plug Power as this is a speculative stock to own, with plenty of downside risk.
David Jagielski has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Investors liked what they heard about two new company initiatives.
Investors have been extremely willing to pay for PayPal (PYPL -0.49%) stock over the past few trading days. They were cheered by the announcement of not one, but two initiatives that, if managed well, will sharpen the company’s competitive edge. This helped push its stock up by over 9% week to date as of Thursday night, according to data compiled by S&P Global Market Intelligence.
The first initiative was made public on Monday. PayPal announced that it was launching a 5% cash-back program for users taking advantage of its buy now, pay later (BNPL) service. This is to remain in force from that day until the end of this year.
Image source: Getty Images.
BNPL has become a go-to option for many American consumers feeling the strain of rising prices. PayPal’s offer seems well timed for the holiday season and should see a decent level of take-up.
The following day, the financial services company introduced a new service, this one targeting small businesses rather than consumers. Its PayPal Ads Manager allows such enterprises to hook into an advertising network and draw revenue from the activity.
While neither of these programs is going to power PayPal’s fundamentals into the stratosphere, they’re going to make the company’s platform at least a bit stickier (if only temporarily, in the case of the time-limited BNPL cash-back arrangement). Any added engagement is a positive, so investors were right to cheer the two news items.
Eric Volkman has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends PayPal. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2027 $42.50 calls on PayPal and short December 2025 $75 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Image source: The Motley Fool.
Thursday, October 9, 2025 at 5 p.m. ET
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer — Brian Shore
President & Chief Operating Officer — Mark Esquivel
Need a quote from a Motley Fool analyst? Email [email protected]
Sales — $16,003,810 in sales for fiscal Q2 2026, slightly above Park Aerospace (PKE 0.97%)‘s previous estimate of $15 million to $16 million.
Gross profit — $5,001,160 in gross profit for fiscal Q2 2026, with a gross margin of 31.2%, despite pressures from low-margin C2B fabric sales and ongoing new plant expenses.
Adjusted EBITDA — Adjusted EBITDA was $3,401,000, at the top end of Park Aerospace’s prior estimate of $3 million to $3.4 million, resulting in an adjusted EBITDA margin of 20.8%.
C2B fabric sales impact — $1.65 million in C2B fabric sold at a small markup weighed on gross margin; $415,000 in ablative materials manufactured with C2B fabric, which command much higher margins, partially offset this effect.
Production vs. sales — Sales closely matched production value during the quarter, resulting in no impact on the bottom line from inventory imbalances.
Customer requalification of C2B fabric — Requalification resumed normal production on 90% of specifications; the remaining 10% is under test, a process estimated to take another nine to twelve months.
Missed shipments — $510,000 attributed to customer certification, and testing delays.
Tariffs — Net tariff impact was minimal at $1,700, with costs passed through, and future exposure is expected to remain limited under current arrangements, as discussed on the fiscal Q2 2026 earnings call.
MRAS LTA price increase — 6.5% weighted average price hike became effective January 1 for the MRAS LTA as stipulated in the long-term agreement.
GE Aerospace sales forecast update — Park Aerospace now forecasts $27.5 million to $29 million in GE Aerospace program sales for fiscal 2026, down from a previous estimate of $28 million to $32 million, with current figures based on updated backlog and booking data.
Q3 outlook — Park Aerospace estimates sales of $16.5 million to $17.5 million for fiscal Q3 2026 and adjusted EBITDA of $3.7 million to $4.1 million.
Expansion capital budget increase — Estimated capital expenditure for new manufacturing facilities rose to $40 million to $45 million due to added line requirements.
Cash and balance sheet — $61.6 million in cash and marketable securities reported at quarter-end after a $4.9 million transition tax payment.
No share repurchases — No shares were bought back during the quarter or to date in fiscal Q3 under the current buyback authorization.
Management disclosed that customer-driven stockpiling of C2B fabric continues to distort product mix, temporarily compressing margins but likely supporting future high-margin material sales as demand converts. Strategic clarity was provided around the critical role of Park Aerospace’s proprietary materials in missile defense and aerospace programs, including the company’s sole-source position on the Patriot missile system’s ablative materials. Park Aerospace signaled intent to further expand U.S. manufacturing capacity for C2B fabric, highlighting both existing and planned investments via partnerships and new plant expenditures. Unlike the previous year, management emphasized that industry OEMs are increasingly collaborating with suppliers and ramping up production to meet robust underlying demand. Long-term sales targets for fiscal 2026 were not formally issued, but management stated that total sales should exceed $70 million, driven by growth in both defense and commercial aerospace programs.
Mark Esquivel stated, “We have approval at about 90% of the specification,” regarding C2B customer requalification, with the remainder expected to take up to twelve more months to resolve.
CEO Shore asserted, “That represents very significant revenue with Park. We’re sole source qualified in that program,” citing sole-source qualification and sharply rising production requirements.
Management described the company’s operational approach as centered on flexibility, urgency, and responsiveness, emphasizing these as Park Aerospace’s core value drivers for customer relationships.
Park Aerospace’s expansion timetable was clarified, with objectives to have plans finalized and implementation underway by year-end to address surging defense and aerospace demand.
C2B fabric: A specialized ablative composite material distributed exclusively by Park Aerospace in North America, primarily for missile defense applications such as the Patriot missile program.
MRAS LTA: Long-term agreement with Middle River Aerostructure Systems (MRAS), under which Park Aerospace is the sole-source provider of composite materials for a range of GE Aerospace jet engine programs.
AOG: Aircraft on Ground; an operational situation where an aircraft is grounded due to technical or maintenance issues, relevant for customer experience and supply chain urgency.
FAL: Final Assembly Line; a manufacturing line where the major components of an aircraft are brought together for assembly and delivery.
Brian Shore: Thank you very much, operator. This is Brian. Welcome everybody to the Park Aerospace Fiscal 2026 Second Quarter Investor Conference Call. I have with me as usual Mark Esquivel, our President and COO. We announced our earnings right after the close. In the earnings release, there are instructions as to how you can access the presentation we’re about to go through. Either via link, and you also can link information in the news release and also on our website. You want to pick that up because we’re gonna go through it. It’ll be a lot more meaningful to listen to us if you have the presentation in front of you. So we have quite a few new investors.
Last quarter, they’ve come on board. And out of consideration for them, I think we should go through some of the legacy items more carefully. I think in the past, legacy items, we just kind of skim over on the assumption that most people already know, are familiar with them. Veteran investors, just please be patient with that. Another item I want to cover with you is that on Tuesday, I had some unplanned oral surgery, and I’m not really feeling that great. So hope you can bear with me. And if I need Mark to take over, I’m sure he’ll be very willing and able to do that.
Questions at the end after we’re done with the presentation, we’ll take questions. And please do ask them. We love questions. Actually, sometimes linked to questions are more meaningful in the presentation. We go through a presentation. We don’t know whether you’re liking it, not liking it, interested, or half asleep. You know, the questions are always more helpful because we then know what people are really interested in, what they’re thinking about. So why don’t we go ahead and get started with the presentation? Slide two is our forward-looking disclaimer language. We’re not gonna go through that. But if you have any questions about it, please let us know. Slide three, table of contents.
Starting on slide one is our Q2 investor presentation, we’re about to go through now. In appendix one, we have supplementary financial information. We’re not gonna go through that during the call, but if you have any questions about it, please let us know. It’s become our practice now or pattern, I guess, to feature James the James Webb Space Telescope in our table of contents. So what we’re talking about here, James Webb Space Telescope discovered cosmic dust which shouldn’t exist outside its galaxy. You know, but shouldn’t exist in quotes. Because I think we’re developing a common theme here. There’s so much that we believed about the universe and its origin, which just isn’t true. Sorry, folks.
Not true. James Webb saying, well, you could believe whatever you want, but these are what’s really going on. So here’s another one of those. Thank you, James Webb Space Telescope. The James Webb Space Telescope was produced with 18 prior Park proprietary Sigma stretch. Let’s go on slide four. Kind of more nitty-gritty stuff here. So quarterly results, let’s look at the right-hand column of the second quarter that we just announced. Sales, $16,003,810. Gross profit, $5,001,160. Gross margin, 31.2%. So we’re happy about gross margins over 30 or maybe I should say we’re unhappy when they’re not over 30.
And it’s good that they’re over 30 because there are a couple of things we’ll talk about in a second that drag down our margins. Adjusted EBITDA, $3,401,000. And adjusted EBITDA margin, 20.8%. What do we say about Q2 during our Q1 call on July 15? Set our sales estimate was $15 to $16 million, so we came a little bit above that. EBITDA estimate, $3 million to $3.4 million. So we came in kind of the top of the range of the EBITDA. I just want to remind you, especially for some of our new investors that we don’t this is not guidance. We don’t do guidance.
We give an estimate we’re saying to you, this is what we think is gonna happen. Now we could be wrong, but this is what we think. There’s I don’t know. Let’s call it practice. We have different terms for it, but let’s call it practice where everybody does it almost where, you know, let’s say it’s gonna be a hundred, they think it’s gonna be a 100. They go out with 90, you know, that’s their guidance. So then when they come out when they come back with a 100, they come out with a 100, then they’re heroes. And I don’t know. We think that’s not worthy of our time.
When we give you an estimate, we’re saying this is what we think is gonna happen. We’re not giving you a number which we plan to beat. Okay? Let’s go on to slide five. Q2 considerations. We always talk, well, always in the last few quarters, Erinn Group is as impact on a lot of things, including the quarter. So we entered into this business partner agreement with Aaron Group. It’s a very large aerospace company in France. Great company and they’re a JV between Airbus and Safran, I believe. And in January 22, we were we’ve been actually working for twenty years. They appointed us exclusive distributor of their Raycarb c two b fabric.
That fabric is used to produce ablative composite materials for XHANCE missile systems programs. Now, sold $1.65 million of that fabric in Q2. As we previously explained, we saw that fabric to our defense industry customers for a small markup. What’s going on here is the defense industry customers are stockpiling the c two b. We’re the exclusive distributor though, so they buy it from us. We buy it from we’re distributor, not a rep. We buy from area. And then we sell it or sell it, I should say, to the OEM.
But it’s of a strange thing because we keep the c two b fabric in our plant because the OEM eventually will ask us to produce prefabric with it. So even though we sell to them and it’s their product, it’s kept on the plan. The markup is small, so we have a significant amount of c two b fabric sales that’s gonna push down our margins. And we sold $415,000 with blade materials manufactured with c two b fabric in Q2. Now the margins on the later materials that we produce those fabric, very, very good. Very good. So that’s the offset.
But it’s still the ratio of sales of fabric to ablative materials manufactured with the CTB fabric are still at a balance. Right? So more fabric than materials, prefrac, let’s call it, What’s the reason? I already said it because the OEMs are stockpiling this product. A more normal kind of ratio would be forty sixty. So 40% would be the materials, and 60% would be the fabric. That’s not always gonna be exactly it, but just to give you a sense, So you see that the ratio is much more than forty sixty here, and that’s gonna drive down our margins. So let’s talk about let’s go on to Slide six rather.
Oh, we’re still on the topic of c two b fabric requalification by one of Park’s key customers of c two b fabric. This was kind of a it’s been a big deal for the last few quarters. Adam, Mark, I like, always give Mark the hard stuff to talk about. Can you help us with what’s going on with that recall?
Mark Esquivel: Yeah. So we actually do have an update this time. I think the last couple calls we said we’re waiting for approval. So do we do have approval. We don’t have full approval. We have approval at about 90% of the specification. I have to get too technical. There’s you know, there’s a requirement within the spec that you have to lower and then upper range. They were somewhere in the middle. They moved down closer to the commercial specification as we call it. Which gets us back into production at, you know, 90 plus percent of everything we have.
So, what we’re doing now is they’re currently testing that last 10% which will probably take another nine to twelve months. So, you know, we’ll continue to talk about know, when we get that approval. But as far as the program’s concerned, we’re back in business. We’re back running. You know, and we’re back to, I would say, you know, normal typical rates that we were running you know, prior to, you know, this I won’t say, issue coming up, but this recall coming up. So and we actually expect to see, you know, some upside, you know, in coming quarters, you know, and Brian will talk about some of that piece as well.
But I guess the story here, the message here is we’re pretty much back in business with, you know, running at our normal level.
Brian Shore: Okay. Thanks, Mark. Good news. Let’s keep moving here. Production versus sales. You bring this up because this has been an issue. Issue in prior quarters in terms of the impact on the bottom line. But in our Q2, our sales value production, we call it SCP, that’s not inventory value. That’s the value production. It’s a sales price. It was well matched with our sales. And that’s a good thing. That means it’s not that’s really very no meaningful, not no impact on bottom line. When our sales exceed our production, that is by a significant amount. That is a negative impact on the bottom line. But no impact in Q2.
And then last thing we’ll talk about in terms of bottom line impacts, significant ongoing expenses. This is something we had in our presentation for several quarters now. It’s not going away anytime soon. We’re operating our new manufacturing facility in Q2, including all these other expenses. And this act this is significant. So that’s why I was saying that the gross margin being over 31%, I think, that’s actually not bad because there’s two factors that hold it down. One is this the expenses related to new plant, the other is the let’s call, excess c two b fabric compared to the c two b material sales.
Total miss shipments, a little bit of surprise here. $510,000, that number is way up. But, you know, last few quarters, we keep talking about international shipping issues. That’s not the issue this time. This time, it’s something different. It’s customer certification, testing delays, a little bit of a new story here. It happens sometimes. You know, it just happens. Not it’s nothing we can do about it. It’s not our fault. Or anything like that, but sometimes it just delays insurance and certification and engineering work and testing delays. So that had a meaningful impact upon our shipments in Q2. So let’s go on to Slide seven, impact of tariffs and tariff split costs. You know what?
I should say net impact. I’m saying that to Mark earlier. It should say net impact the tariff and tariff related cost because we have tariffs. It’s just that the net impact takes into account the pass through. So very minimal in Q2. Hardly anything, but that’s the net impact. That’s not the total tariff. That’s a net impact because of the fact that we passed the tariff cost on. And then the future impacts, I think we’ll get back to that later Mark will talk through that later on in the presentation. Why don’t we go on to slide eight? So this is a slide we do every quarter, as you know.
Some of you veterans are probably tired of the top five, and it’s kinda usual suspects also. Like, alright. GKN, Kratos, MRAS, Tech. And. Tech is not well, you know, has it’s kind of a little bit of a new name for us, but the rest are usually suspects. The 7,500 that refers to Nordium, the h three two one n with XLR, that’s an that’s an MRAS program. Kratos, obviously, is Kratos, and the seven eight seven Dreamliner, that’s GKN. That’s for the Gen X one b engine. So it’s a it’s a g engine, but it’s not part of the MRAS LTA, which we’ll go into that later. Let’s go on slide nine.
So here we have our estimated revenues by air aerospace market segments. We call them our pie charts. I know about you, but I like to use it. Think they tell a bit of a story. Fiscal twenty one, that was the pandemic year where commercial aircraft was remember, there were airplanes, pictures of, like, seven thirty sevens not falling at all. Like, two people on them and they were, you know, basically, they were being parked. And then after that, the pie charts, you know, seem to be fairly stable.
Interesting what will be interesting is to see what will happen in the future because the commercial is gonna be accelerating because the program’s are on as those programs ramp up, but military will be accelerating a lot. This is probably it could go down as a percentage. We’ll see about that. Let’s go on to slide 10. Park Plus, niche military state programs. So we have a little pie chart here Radomes, missile systems, unmanned aircraft, all niche markets for us, some markets. But even aircraft structures are niche markets for us. So we actually changed we used to call it what, rocket nozzles, I think.
We changed the missile systems because the missile systems, we supply it to more than just the rock and nozzle other aspects of missiles that we supply it to. I think we used call unmanned aircraft drones, but I think more politically correct term is unmanned aircraft, but there’s no change in there. You know what? And other than nice pictures and you could see what the programs are, we really are not gonna talk about these programs anymore. It’s just not really appropriate. For us to say very much about the programs except understand, please, any picture we show you, that means it’s a program we’re on, not a program we like or a cool picture or something. Okay.
You got it. Let’s go on to slide 11. GE Aerospace and Engine programs. Again, a slide every quarter. But for the benefit of some of our new investors, let me try to explain quickly. So we have a firm LTA requirements contract for nineteen to twenty nine with MRAS Middle River Aerostructure Systems, a sub of ST Engineering Aerospace, You see we’re sole source for, you know, for composite materials. For all these programs, which are all GE programs. So what’s going on here? If you look at all the checked items below, they’re all GE engine programs.
And then what’s going on here is that even we got on these programs with GE Aviation, even before 2019 when Ameres was owned by GE Aviation. Now GE Aerospace. We got on these programs even before that. They were predecessor LTAs before this nineteen to twenty nine LTA. And then I think about five years ago, GE sold MRAS to ST Engineering, which is a large Singapore aerospace company. So that’s the explanation there. I’ve done a factory, you know about that. You know, when I guess around 02/2019, g said to us, look. You know, Park we’re gonna put we’ll give you this ten year agreement for sole solar source and all this stuff.
All these great programs, wonderful programs, but, you know, we really are concerned about redundancy. So would you please build on the factory? And we said, yes. We checked that box. That’s been done. I’m not gonna go through the individual program, maybe except to get didn’t know to talk about the first five are really all eight through 20 neo family aircraft programs. Alright. Do you have any questions about the specific programs? Just let us know. Let’s go on to slide 12 just to keep moving along here. Item the first item on slide 12, we’re just continuing here.
It’s this is a little bit of a nuance here because this is this program is was mentioned in the prior slide, but this is a different component. This and this also is part of our GE Aerospace LTA not necessarily the not the MRAS LTA. So I’m probably gonna hang only the technical, not necessary. Fan case is something we should talk about for a second. This is with g nine x engine triple seven x airplane. This is produced with our AFP material and other composite materials or the major fire replacement. That’s what the AFP stands for. It’s a robotic way, method for producing composite structures.
And this is planned to be included in the LIFER program, MRC life of program agreement. Next item. We had a 6.5% weighted average price increase in our MRASLTA effective January 1. That was that was already built in the s LTA, you know, a long time ago. And next item, park the LTA was park MRSA LTA was meant to include three proprietary formulation products and those are now going undergoing qualification Then life of program agreement have requested by MRAS and STE So we’re still negotiating this, I guess, and I think there’s a meeting that’s being planned for next month. We’ll see what happens. As I said to you many times, we’re okay either way.
This is requested by SDE and MRAS. It’s something they want. They want the stability of long term supply. But either we’re okay either way. If we do it, that’s fine. If not, we’ll be fine. As well. And it’s still under negotiation. It I don’t wanna give you the wrong impression It’s all, like, actually negotiating. We it’s like we talk about it, then three months go by, and then, you know, so I think now we’re planning to have some get together in December to sorry, November to hopefully get through this. We’ll see. We’ll keep you posted.
Item page 13 rather, slide 13, So let’s talk an update on some of these GA change programs, age between a Neo family. That’s a wonderful, wonderful program that Park is on, sole source qualified. And let’s talk about that program. Everybody says a huge backlog of these airplanes, over 7,000 of them. That’s a lot of airplanes. A lot of airplanes. And let’s just talk about the well, whether the we can take a look at the aircraft, the A320neo family aircraft deliveries. We’re not gonna go through it here, but, you know, you can see what’s going on here.
With the amount of orders that Airbus has, we’ll get to in a second, they would be at a much higher rate. Than this. They’d be at 75 per month. What’s be what’s holding them back is issues with supply chain. So this year, year to date, we’re at 44, but don’t get fooled by that because they usually, kinda make their year in the last three months. And if you look at September, you could see what’s going on here. They’re already the Airbus is already ramping up 59. We’re delivered in ’59 is your 20 neo family aircraft delivered in September. Let’s keep going. Slide 14, just continuing here. The importantly, the engine supply bottleneck.
Remember I said that one of big issue is supply chain restrictions That’s what’s preventing Airbus from ramping up. To their target of 75, which gives it a minute 75 per month. CFM, they have another engine. Let’s just talk about CFM, the LEAP one a engine. Reportedly improving that it’s getting better. And I think that’s a deliberate focus by g and SCFM, which is a very good thing because that’s probably the most significant restriction to Airbus’s ability to ramp up to that 75. They it’d be up there now, they upon how many orders they have. So that’s that’s very good news actually.
As we already alluded to, Airbus is targeting a delivery rate of 75, eight H320neo family per month you could see that, you know, they’re still at, you know, 50 to 55, so they still have a way to go, quite a way to go. Two engines approved for the a three twenty neo aircraft. We’re on the CFM LEAP one a engine. We’re not on the we have nothing no content on the Pratt and Whitney GTF engine. And so I guess that covers the second bullet item. We supply into the h three twenty family aircraft using the LEAP-1A engine.
According to the second quarter, 2025 edition of Aero Engine News, which is kinda like a bible, for us anyway. The CFM LEAP one a’s market share with you know, compared to the Pratt market share, aforementioned orders, A320neo family, 20 neo family aircraft per month, that’s 64.7% market share translates into 1,165 LEAP engines per year. That’s a real lot of engines and, you know, lots of revenue per park at that point. Slide 15, As of June 30, 2025, few months ago, were a little over 8,000 firm LEAP one a engine orders. These are not These are LEAP one a engine orders where we’re sole source qualified. Over 8,000.
If you wanna look at slide 29, you get a feel for what our revenue per unit is due to, you know, get your pocket calculator out and do the math. You could see what that worth to us. Those are just the firm orders that are in the books now. So this is a big deal for Park. The Airbus h three twenty one XLR, and this is a variant. We’re still talking a three twenty family. Okay? We’re not off to a different aircraft. This is part of the a 20 family. This is recently introduced, supposedly changed the air map of the world. Why is that?
Because the payload and range capability of this aircraft are very unusual for a single aisle. So it allows a single aisle to compete against wide bodies, but obviously, at much lower cost. So that’s why it’s changing your map of the world. Qantas is you know, very involved in the program, American Airlines, Iberia Airlines. The reason I highlight this is a lot of lot of airlines are buying this airplane. Why am I highlighting this They call it a game changer. But what’s really, I think, very impressive to me is that they say they claim they’ve had almost no AOGs that’s aircraft on grounds after almost a year. That’s really a big deal.
Because normally, the first year or two, there’s all kind of bugs you have to get out of a new airplane, a new design, and the airplane sits on the ground a lot. And it’s kind of you just expect it. It’s not good because, you know, when the air airplane’s sitting on the ground, the airlines aren’t making any money. And you kind of expect that if you get a, you know, an airplane that’s been recently certified and delivered. But here you go, they’re they’re saying almost no way AOGs. I’ve never heard of anything like that. That’s quite impressive. Boeing has no response. To this aircraft. Let’s go on to slide 16.
Mark Esquivel: So still on a three twenty here, folks.
Brian Shore: Airbus plans to open a new a three twenty aircraft family final assembly lines, FALs, in The US and China this month. Know, this couple weeks. So these two new FALs in combination with the existing FALs, FALs in Germany and France will provide Airbus with the manufacturing capability to achieve a 75 h 20 neo aircraft per month delivery goal in ’27. So, you know, this is nice because Airbus is they’re putting your money more than mouth this year. These FALs are they’re they’re a big deal. So that’s good news. And then breaking news, October 7 oh, this is the day in my oral surgery, I think. Yeah. There are two big things happened on October 7.
That’s just two days ago. The a three twenty aircraft family became the world’s most liver commercial jet ever. Of course, that means it beat out the seven thirty seven Not just a max. This is the seven thirty seven family versus the a three twenty family. pretty big news, I guess. COMC nine one nine that’s a Chinese made aircraft. Comac is targeting oh, this airplane is designed to compete single aisle with They’re targeting a thirty nine one nine aircraft delivered in 25. But recent and confirmed reports saying they’re probably for sure for sure that this target. I can’t tell you I’m very surprised.
I probably would’ve you know, to be just totally candid about it, I would be more surprised if they met the target. I’m not gonna go into why, but it but I’m not I’m not surprised or really disappointed. Malaysian Airlines, AirAsia, has confirmed its advanced talks to purchase these airplanes. Why is that important? Why am I on that? Because there are a lot of air airlines that are buying this airplane. But the reason I’m focusing on is this is a non Chinese airline. This airplane is certified by the Chinese FAA, I think, called CAAC or something like that. So the thought was originally this Comac airplanes would be China only airplanes.
Well, that’s not what Comac wants. They’re still the airplane outside of China for operations outside of China. The plan to achieve reduction rate of 200 airplanes But what’s interesting here, they’re they delivered it to same kind of topic really. Laos Airlines, Air Cambodia, signed up. Again, what’s what’s the theme here? Non Chinese airlines. So, originally, you’re thinking the China the Comac airplanes are gonna be China only, but that’s obviously not what Comac wants. Triple seven x, Boeing triple seven x, we have slowed down a little bit talk, but this one, this is a, you know, important program for 1,500 out flights and nearly 4,100 out flight hours. That’s a lot. That’s good.
This picture was taken by a friend of mine a couple of few years ago when the triple seven x was doing cold weather testing in Fairbanks, Good place to go for cold weather testing. So let’s talk let’s go on slide 18. Sorry. Boner poorly 565 open orders for the airplane. Boeing had previously announced that the airplane program was on track for certification late twenty five and entry into service. 26. The Boeing CEO recently stated the certification program is falling behind schedule. The CEO further stated the aircraft and the engine did Gen X engines, the nine x range, g nine x engine are really performing quite well.
And that the potential delay in certification was being caused by increasingly deliberate FPA scrutiny. Get the sense there’s some tension there Boeing and the FAA. You I do anyway. A key gating item for is the receipt of the called the type inspection authorization from the FAA. Because as the CEO explains, you know, they can fly these airplanes. They need to have five airplanes to use for certification program, but those flights don’t really count, you know, towards certification. Till they get to the TIA. There’s a lot of boxes that have to be checked for airplane to be certified. So they can go fly the airplane, which is good.
They can learn a lot more about the airplane, but they can’t check those boxes until they get their TIA from the FAA. Boeing hasn’t announced any new targets for the certification and EIS, but speculations that they’d be pushed into next year at ’26. Let’s go on to slide 19. So let’s talk about big picture GE aerospace jet engine sales history forecast estimates. The top is the sales history. One go control history accepted the site and q $27,500,000.0. But a little higher than we forecast. GE Aerospace program sale forecast, sales forecast estimates, Again, not guidance estimates.
Two three, we’re estimating $7.5 to $8,000,000 And total for the year, got a slow down here a little bit, $27.5 to 29,000,000 Now in our prior presentation, we indicated that we’re looking at 28 to 32,000,000 for the year for fiscal twenty six. But as we explained to you, information called a bill plan from our customer. Wasn’t our forecast. It was their forecast. Now we have now the current forecast 27 and half to 29. That’s now part forecast based upon what? Based upon the backlog for Q3 and Q4. Q3 is already booked. Q4 is partially booked and what we expect, you know, based on lots of life experience to the additional bookings for Q4.
So now this is our number, 27 and a half 29,000,000. Let’s go on to Slide 20. Park’s financial performance history and forecast estimates. Estimate singular. So we just have the history up top. You already saw this just for perspective and context. Down below, our Q3 twenty six Q3 financial forecast estimates. Now plural Uh-oh. Sales of 16 and a half to 17 and a half million, Adjusted EBITDA, 3.7 to 4,100,000.0. That’s our estimate for Q3. You have any questions about that, just let us know. So let’s go on to slide 21. This is just history, and we’ve showed you the slide for the last several quarters.
We think it’s interesting just so you can see what’s going on here. Historically. You go from 17 to 20, like, every year. We increased by about 10,000,000, then we got stalled out. So we’re kind of at into fiscal twenty five, we’re pretty much where we were fiscal twenty. And, obviously, that’s because of the pandemic You know, the pandemic really had a very big impact on commercial aerospace. It wasn’t the pandemic so much, it’s how we responded to it, how the industry responded to it, especially with respect to supply chain issues that’s held back commercial aerospace. So just one other thing. We’re not giving you a forecast for fiscal twenty six this time.
But we believe that the number will be over 70,000,000 for fiscal twenty six. We’ll just give you that number. We’re not giving EBITDA, not giving details I think what’s going on here, though, is the industry is getting religion. And it’s not just an opinion. This is based on my life of input we received. Different kind of attitude on the part of the OEM in terms of ramp up to meet demand and also working with suppliers and supply chain in a much more productive and you know, a more, I know, more collaborative way. Sorry. Coming up trying to come up that word collaborative way. So it’s not just a little thing. It’s a big thing.
It’s it’s very palpable in the industry. Happens. But to us, it seems like there’s something really going on here. And we’re not we’re not alone in that opinion. We’re not alone in that opinion. So let’s see what happens. You know, just so you know, we’re probably looking about a little over 70,000,000 for fiscal twenty five. Let’s go on to slide 22. Okay. General park updates. Agreements with Arian. Okay. We gotta slow down with Arian again. We entered in that business partner agreement in January 22, wondering which Arian ported up. Pointed us as exclusive North American distributor. We already covered that. Okay?
But then on March 27, ’25, just early this year, Park and Aaron entered part they’re a great partner. They’re a wonderful partner. We love them. I entered into a new agreement under which Park will advance I don’t know. It’s probably about 5,000,000 for million, €587,000 against future purchases by Park of c two b fabric. These funds will be used by Erie to help finance the purchase of additional installation of new manufacturing equipment for Aireon’s production of the p c two fabric in France. And that was that should be paid to area in three installments the first of which is already paid about, you know, $1,000,303,176,000 euro. That’s about $1,500,000.
So that would affect our cash when we reported Q1. Let’s move to Slide 23 rather. The purpose newest of this new agreement is to provide additional c two b fabric manufacturing capacity to support the rapidly increasing demand for c two b in c two b fabric in Europe and North America. Just so you know, one of the big programs that uses c two b fabric is the Patriot Missile Program. Ariane Group recently asked to partner to partner again with them on a study related to the potential significant increase of c two b fabric manufacturing capacity presumably in The US. The study expected cost about €700,000.
We split it $50.50, so that’s probably about $410,000 Park, and we’ll record that when our Q3 is a special item. Just want to be aware of that. We’ll get back to this later on the presentation on the area study. Just continuing with general updates, our lightning strike protection material certified on the Passport 20 engine. Using the using the Bombardier Global 7,508,000 Bisinjet. Its revenue is about approximately 500,000 per year expected on our LSB material. We’re very happy about this. Our LSB is already qualified, approved, and used on the a three twenty and the nine one nine, but have not just getting it approved now.
On the s four twenty engine and also thought to get approved on what’s called the 10 a engine for the back nine zero nine. So and we expect that these revenues will start to kick in fairly soon, let’s say, in a couple of months. Slide 24, still updates. This is just something we covered already. We signed we entered into an LTA with Aerospace. And for calendar years twenty five to thirty. Parked and then another update. Parked discussion with two Asian industrial conglomerates relating to Asian manufacturing. Do inventors continue? We’ve been talking about this for a while. John Jamieson’s in Asia now working on this project along with one of our other guys.
So we’ll see what happens. Seems interesting, but we’ll see what happens. Okay, Mark. Your turn. Tariff, international trade issues, what’s the expected impact of tariffs going forward, you think?
Mark Esquivel: I don’t think much. I know this quarter alone, we had about $1,700, which, you know, we don’t like to take on any additional cost. But that was mostly, you know, nonmaterial. Items. So going forward, again, as I mentioned before, we got ahead of this pretty early. You know, we’re, we put controls in place to manage it. We’re, passing the cost along to our customers, whether it’s through you know, contracts or, you know, stuff like our POs or stuff like that or order confirmation. So I don’t expect you know, to see much. I mean, it’s obviously a dynamic situation. I don’t think all the tariffs are completely locked in.
It’s been a little quiet in the news lately. But where we’re at today and what we’ve seen so far, it’s it’s very impact to our business.
Brian Shore: K. Thanks, Mark. So let’s keep going here. Current MRAS supplier core scorecard or scores. What happened? We don’t have all hundreds. Here. We don’t have all hundreds. Does MRS still love us? Yeah. I think they do. I think I mentioned to you in prior quarters that told that most suppliers would be happy to get eighties. And Emirates finds it a little bit humorous that we ask, well, what happened? And what we doing what do we need to do to fix these tissues? It’s called technical issue in terms of what how we recorded something. So we take it seriously. We’re we’re a 100 company. We’re not a 99.7 country, company rather. So we take it seriously.
And, like I said, MRC I think, finds it a little amusing that we spent so much time talking about why we’re not on a what not why we didn’t get a 100 on when we reached scores. Let’s go on to slide 25. So making customers love us, this is still in our general updates, is central to what we call parks egg strategy. How do we make our customers love us? With our calling cards of flexibility, urgency, and responsiveness? By asking how high before our customers say jump. And we’re not kidding about this. We’ll go to customers and say, what else can we do? What else can we do? What else can we do?
Before they even ask us for anything. Making customers love us is a boiler room thing, not a boardroom thing. You know, the board’s on board. With a strategy. You know? We’ve certainly reviewed it with the board. But the strategy happens on the factory floor, not on the boardroom. That’s where the rubber hits the road. It’s up to all our people to make the strategy work. It’s a boiler room thing. So first, for this strategy to work, all of our people need to be bought into it and feel passionate about it. Making customers love us is the secret to our success.
You know, it’s a hidden plain sight secret You know, sometimes the most brilliant ideas are the most obvious ones. With a benefit of hindsight and the well, why didn’t I think of that? I don’t know. Why didn’t you think of So the secret is kind of hidden plain sight, but it’s a secret to our success. Slide 26, buyback authorization. We don’t have to spend a lot of time on this. Let’s just go down to the last two check items We did not purchase any shares, and in fiscal in our second quarter, and we don’t we’ve not purchased any shares so far in our third quarter date.
I don’t think we’ll be my feeling, my opinion is we probably won’t be purchasing too many shares in the near future, but we’ll see about that. Slide 27, again, this is just gonna review Park’s balance sheet cash and incredible cash dividend history. Long term debt, we don’t have any. We had reported $61,600,000.0 of cash and marketable securities. At the end of Q2. But we also made a final transition tax installment payment of $4,900,000.0 in Q2. And Q1, we recorded cash in into q 1 of $656,000,000. So if you take that $4,900,000.0 subtracted from $65.6 million, it gets you to that $61,600,000.0 number more or less. It explains the difference.
Forty sec consecutive years of interrupted uninterrupted regular cash dividends, and we’ve now paid over $606,000,000 or going in $9 and cents per share in cash dividends since the beginning of fiscal two thousand five. This is our Park Founders. The run reason we placed a picture of our Park Founders here is because we started out with basically nothing. We’re two guys that started the company, I think, in 1954 with about $40,000 that they had saved from war duty. And, you know, here we are paying over $600,000,000 of cash dividends in last twenty years or so. Let’s go on to slide 28. Okay.
We can kind of skim through this because these three slides are exactly how the same slides that we showed you last quarter. I think the quarter before that. Financial outlooks for GE Aerospace change and Juggernaut, call it Juggernaut. It’s a timing. We’re not sure where to talk about yeah, the nine one nine is, you know, a little slow ramping up. And the triple seven x is having a little more difficult difficulty getting certified. So we don’t know. We don’t really spend a lot of time worrying about that. But the thing is that we say it’s a juggernaut. It’s coming. It can’t be stopped, and the key thing for us is we better be ready.
You go on to slide 29. There’s no change. Anything here that all the numbers are exactly the same. Like I said, the pre you know, relate to a previous slide, we feel that GE and CFM have kind of gotten a religion that they’re they’re really focused on ramping up production and working closely and collaboratively with the supply chain. Slide 30 is just footnotes related to the prior slides. We won’t go through those. If you have any questions, any of this, let us know. Okay. Let’s go on to slide 31, Warren Peace, Park Gingernaut. Peace for the Question War. These slides came from originated in the last quarter, although there’s some updates to them.
The first thing I wanna cover again though is we’re not providing any inside information on any of these programs. All every all this information in these slides is based upon publicly reported news and reports. We don’t give away inside information. Especially with defense programs. Unprecedented demand for missile systems. Missile systems stockpiles have been seriously depleted by the wars in Europe and Mideast there’s an urgent need to replenish the depleted missile system stockpiles. According to Wall Street Journal reporting, the Pentagon is pushing defense OEMs to double or even quadruple missile system production on a breakneck schedule quotes, partly in preparation for potential conflict with China.
List of Pentagon targeted missile systems, including PAC three missile system, the LRASM, and the s m six. The Patriot missile system is a particular priority. I think you should know the park is on all those programs, participates in all those programs, all three of them. Review and update of the PAC three Patriot missile system. The reason we spend more time talking about this is a lot of public visibility and information about it. Some of the other programs we’re on, it could be quite significant, but we’re not able to even mention what they are.
The largest deployment of PACS prepaid missile systems in history occurred in response to Iran’s ballistic missile strikes on our air base in Qatar. Going on to slide 32, What happened here, in anticipation of this, I guess we knew what’s gonna happen, We moved Patriot missile system to Qatar from South Korea and Japan knowing what was coming And we called it a shell game, you know, moving the systems one place to another. That’s not sustainable. The Department of War wants to very significantly increase patriot missile stockpiles in Asia to protect bases and allies in the Pacific region. So this is not working out very well at all, is it?
We take missile systems out of South Korea and Japan because we have this issue with Iran. And now we deplete their systems when the Department of War wants to significantly increase the patriot missile stockpiles in Asia. See the problem? So just public stuff. Israelis supply a patriot missile systems seriously depleted. Ukraine supply of patron missile systems. Seriously depleted. Other countries have been waiting for Patriot missile systems for years.
September 3225, Lockheed’s Missile and Fire Control division received its biggest contract in history, a $9.8 billion award from the US Army 1,970 Patriot missiles Patriot missiles According to the Wall Street Journal, the Department of War wants suppliers to ramp up to produce approximately 2,000 Patriot missiles per year which is almost four times the current production rate. Didn’t we say something about quadruple in the prior slide? We did. Four times production rate. So we’re talking about well, we’ll get to I’m gonna wait and wait. We’ll get to in a second because I thought you say park is all sorts qualified. We’ll get to that in a second. Let’s go on to slide 33.
Patriot missile systems are planned to be incorporated into the Golden Dome. As apparent from the reporting that The US plans to do much more than just replenish these depleted systems. So next hour item, parts ports, the patron missile system with specially ablated materials produced in areas of c two b fabric, And Parker sole source qualified for specially ablated materials on this program. So I was gonna say at the bottom of slide three two, there’s 2,000 missiles per year. That represents very significant revenue with Park. We’re sole source qualified in that program. Park, we’re back to slide 33. Sorry to bounce around on you here.
Parkers recently asked to increase our expected output of specially inflated materials for the program by significant orders of magnitude. We can’t really say how much but significant orders of magnitude, hopefully, that gives some kind of feel for what’s going on here. And we will fully support this request partly with the additional manufacturing capacity provided by our major facilities expansion, which we’ll discuss below. Remember that Park recently entered into this new agreement going back to area? With Arian for the purpose of increasing c two b fabric manufacturing capacity. Let’s go on to slide 34. But will that additional manufacturing capacity be enough? Considering what’s going on with the Patriot missile? No. I don’t think so.
As discussed above, park partnering with Aaron Group in a study related to potentially significantly increasing c two b fabric manufacturing capacity presumably in The US. This is a big deal. Let me just say this. Once we’re our we’re our partnership when a study is done, that’s not the end of the partnership. I don’t think anyway. That’s not what we’re talking about. I’m not gonna say anything more about it, but let me just say it’s a big deal. We covered the arrow three four missile systems last time, so we just kinda covered it again. Not too much here. Last item, updated parts involvement. Remember, we’re we were second source qualified in the r o three.
We weren’t really expecting orders. We got them. We already got them. Our four were sold source qualified on the hour four, which is expected to go into production, think relatively soon. Let’s go on to slide 35. This is really probably the most important slide this whole warrant piece section of the presentation. The above missile programs are just a small representation of critical missile programs parked is supporting or planning to support There are too many programs to iterate here, and many, probably most, are too confidential and sensitive to mention for national security or other reasons. But, you know, this is highlighted or bold whatever you an italics.
But please understand that certain of these programs represent very significant revenue for 36. Major expansions. So I’m just gonna give a quick update here. I know we’re running late, with time, but got a lot to cover here. And like I said, we got new investors, so we couldn’t just skim through things too much. A major new expansion, we talked about this in the of our manufacturing facility. We talked about this in the last February presentations, I believe. So we’re planning a major new expansion of our manufacturing facilities. It could be at Newton, or elsewhere. The plant expansion will include manufacture following lines elution treating, hot melt film, hot melt tape, hypersonic materials manufacturing.
A current estimated capital budget for new manufacturing plant equipment 40 to 45,000,000. That’s gone up. I mean, I forget what we said last quarter, maybe $30.35 to forty. Why’d it go up? Well, we know the line. That extra $5,000,000 is for another line because the requirements keep going up and up and up. It’s quite incredible, So new manufacturing slide three seven, just continuing new manufacturing, major new manufacturing major new expansion of parts manufacturing facilities. Why are we doing this? Are juggernauts required? We have a juggernaut for the aerospace. We have a juggernaut for defense and missile programs. Our long term business forecast requires it.
And the second bullet item under the that check item is that our forecast has increased since we talked to you on July 15. And also have manufacturing capacity needed for park to be parked. Or calling cards. Again, flexibility, responsiveness, urgency. We don’t run a business a mill, meaning that, okay, we campaign and you want something, well, we could figure when maybe a year from December. We don’t run our business that way. Urgency, responsiveness, flexibility. So it’d be really stupid for 38. We’re just continuing on the expansion We’re not sharing our long term business forecast this time. But opportunities for Park are significant. Timing is now.
We must take advantage of the opportunities We must not hesitate or we will squander the end quotes, once in a lifetime opportunities we have sacrificed so much over many years to develop. So this is kind of interesting. There was a board meeting last week and Mark was discussing with the board some of these missile programs and used the term once in a lifetime our opportunities. And the board was really got thought, well, let’s come from Mark. This must be really big. You know? Because Mark is not a guy who’s given to hyperbole. You know? He’s usually a skeptical guy, which is good. You know, you want your president to be skeptical of things.
That was his quote, went to lifetime and the board’s thought, wow. This must be a big thing then. Our objective is to have our expansion plan in place by the end of the calendar year and to be moving into implementation. The implementation phase by or a plan by then. Slide 39. How are doing at Park? Let’s change gears a little bit. I’m sorry. It’s gonna take you so long, but like I said, we’re trying to cover a lot of things here. So what are parks objectives? This is How do we measure success? I think there’s a lot of misunderstanding about this. So let’s talk about it. We measure success.
Our objectives are getting qualified sole source qualified whenever possible on chosen special aerospace programs. These are programs you wanna be on. These are the special programs, the wonderful programs. That’s our success. Once we get qualified on our chosen special programs, our objectives have been achieved. We’re done. Once we’re qualified in those children programs, in italics, all we need to do is support those programs with what? Extreme urgency, flexibility, responsiveness. That’s it. Other than that, it’s up to the program OEMs to determine the side of quickly their programs will ramp. That is not something over which we have control, and it’s not even our concern. We’re in the program. We achieved our objective.
Our objectives has been achieved. Some guy wrote something about you know, we’re shifting blame or mitigation plans, and it’s just kind of a total misunderstanding of how a park and our objectives and how we operate. Once we got in these programs, sole source qualified, our objectives have been realized. And we let’s talk about it. How we done with our objectives? If you ask me, we have been incredibly successful. We’ve gotten on wonderful aerospace programs, a special program that you want to be on. Most of which we can’t mention. You know, you know some of them already, a three twenty,
Mark Esquivel: Wow. Patriot. Wow.
Brian Shore: A lot of them we can’t mention. Slide 40. And we were nobodies when we came into the aerospace industry. We came from nowhere. You know, we welcomed into the industry with open arms. With the entrenched competitors, I don’t think so. They didn’t want us. I mean, they were brought polite and respectful Well, they clearly didn’t want they did not welcome us. We achieved what we achieved against great odds, incredible success, by getting on these programs that are the envy of the industry. From nowhere, nothing. Went into an industry where there’s in aerospace, there’s a lot of entrenchment. People kinda programs, they get very complacent sometimes. That’s not us. We don’t do that. Are we lucky?
If you ask me, we earned everything we got. Are we an overnight success? I don’t think so. There’s been a long and difficult row much sacrifice along the way. It’s a road we chose. Let’s go on to slide 41. I think that’s our last slide. Almost there, folks. Very fortunately for all of us, Park has the courage and conviction. This should be involved because it’s important to stay the course with our principles that are simple but elegant. X strategy in the face of sometimes unrelenting doubts, negativity, and skepticism. Very fortunate of all of us meaning, you know, investors too. Very fortunate that we stood our ground and our knees didn’t buckle.
We did what we thought was right, under know, quite a bit of pressure. Because if we didn’t do that, we wouldn’t be where we are now We wouldn’t be looking at these once in a life lifetime opportunities. Wouldn’t be. And we’d all be we’d all lose out. You know? We’ll lose out. So how are we doing at Park? We believe Park has done a remarkable job of positioning our company to capitalize our thank you, Mark, once in a lifetime opportunities we are now facing. These are unprecedented times. For Park. Okay, operator, so we’re done with our presentation, we have to take any questions at this time.
Operator: Thank you, Mr. Shore. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line has been You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset pressing the star keys. I see we have a question coming from Nick Ripostella from NR Management. Your line is now live. Please proceed with your question.
Nick Ripostella: Hey. Good afternoon. Once again, nice presentation, nice quarter. And, just a couple of, easy questions. I’ve been thinking about Park and all the exciting things going on. How do you feel about, the need for additional sales personnel or are you feel that everything you have there is adequate? You’ve got so much going on. I’m just wondering, are you covered in that area? Sufficiently? And the second thing is I know you say you’re not prepared at this time to share the long term forecast. So do you think like, sometime next calendar year, you can kind of give people a longer term view of where this company could be and three to five years.
You know, there’s so many things that are blossoming. You know? You truly are a growth company, but and then the third thing is and I know this is not your primary function, obviously, but you must be on the radars of, firms out here to pick up research coverage. You know? There’s so much research out there now by niche firms, and you have such a great story. I was just wondering if anything’s happening in that regard. Thank you so much.
Brian Shore: Thanks, Nick. Thanks for your questions. So let’s take them in order. Additional salespeople, you know, I think Mark, you can chime in. We’ve learned a lot over the last twenty years, and I think our view on salespeople is a little bit skeptical. I couldn’t refer to have additional technical people, engineering people, in terms of getting more business. We certainly have our hands full of what we have already, but we’re always interested in new opportunities, new opportunities. They’re coming pretty fast and furious. But they’re not coming because of salespeople.
They’re coming because you know, it’s a small industry, particularly in the fence side, and we have close ties with a lot of the OEMs and the military as well. So the work gets out pretty quickly. The important thing is we have engineering people to support those activities rather than salespeople that go get those the business. And I’m not sure that really works anyway. I don’t think that I don’t know. Mark chime in. The typical OEMs really are that interested in you know, the guy bringing donuts and a slick salesman. More interested in what you can do, how you can help us.
And that’s gonna be more of an engineering discussion, or it could be a supply chain discussion. Okay. No. How can you support us in terms of providing a product to us? But the you know, I don’t know. I’m a little skeptical about whether additional salespeople are we wanna talk about at this point. Why don’t we Mark, why don’t you chime in? I’ll take the other two, questions, but why don’t you chime in if you have anything wanna add to that, my answer on that question.
Mark Esquivel: Yeah, Brian. I think you’re correct. I mean, we work really close with the technical and engineering folks and kinda goes back to our strategy too. They have priorities, and they need to get projects And, you know, we work directly with them and help them develop, you know, new programs and products. And that really helps us get business more so than the traditional, like you said, Brian, going to the supply chain people bringing donuts. A little different, you know, in our industry. It’s more technical, more engineering driven. And if you’re satisfying you know, those groups, you know, that’s how the business usually comes our way.
Brian Shore: Yeah. Good. Thank you. Yeah. I think a lot of times it come it comes to us rather than we go into it. You know? But, you know, is a real kinda small, close in industry, and people know where to find us. Long term forecast, I understand. Understand why you’re asking that. I think what we’ll try to do in Q3 is provide some information a little bit like, a little reluctant because I think the number is gonna be shocking. To our investors.
Nick Ripostella: I want some nice shopping.
Brian Shore: Yeah. Okay. Well, let’s see we can let’s see what we can do to give you more perspective, quantitative perspective. When we announce Q3. Okay? Would that be alright? And we’ll work on that. I’m not saying we’ll give you a hard, like, three or four year forecast, but there’s something that, you know, you could sink your teeth into a little bit more. And the research, you know, we’re here. I mean, they were know where to find us, so we’d be happy to be covered. Like I said, Nick, not really our principal focus, but we’d be happy to be covered. And, you know, if anybody’s interested, I’m happy to talk to them.
I think we are seeing a lot more visibility in the last few months or so. So we’ll see what happens. I don’t believe there’s anything imminent where somebody’s about to pick us up right now. We’re very open to pick to being covered. So, hopefully, those that is when
Nick Ripostella: when the revenue doubles from here, then they’ll come around. You know? That’s that’s the way it happens a lot. But Maybe
Brian Shore: Yeah. Maybe you’re right. Any other questions you have, Nick, or does that cover it?
Nick Ripostella: No. Thank you so much. And you know, it’s it’s glad to see that all the hard work, you know, the stock has caught lightning in the bottle after the last quarter, and it’s good. It’s night it’s a nice thing to see hard work appreciated and reflected in the value. You know? It must make all the employees and everybody feel good and the investors, obviously. But so thank you. Sure.
Brian Shore: It’s a good thing. Thank you very much for input, Nick. Operator, do we have any other questions?
Operator: Currently, there are no further questions at this time. Oh, I actually see one just popping in by Chris Showers. Private investor. Chris, your line will be unmuted. Please proceed with your question.
Chris Showers: Hi. Thank you. Brian, just, I guess, two questions. You mentioned the c two b material being a sixty forty lower to higher margin mix. When the Patriot missile gets ramped up, will that be constant, or can you get a higher mix there with the higher revenue converted material.
Brian Shore: So I’ll I’ll answer that. So what’s going on here is they’re stockpiling. Stockpiling. And that’s why there’s the ratio was not really balanced. At the end of the day, though, there will be a certain amount of c two b fab that’s required to make the c two b material. But at the end of the day, it all has kinda even out. You know? Right now, the OEMs are stockpiling Why? Because they’re nervous. They want as much as they can get. Because they see where the, you know, where the future is going, and they’re not stopping. You know. They’re gonna keep stockpiling, I think.
But eventually, you know, their plan is not to just have that stuff sitting in their factory, of course. It for us to produce the material that’s used to make the rockinized materials for the rock nozzle structures for the Patriot missile system.
Chris Showers: Okay. And is there timing on that where you think that might pick up? This calendar year?
Brian Shore: Yeah. I think as Mark alluded to, you know, we had this issue with the recall, and that was slowing down our a lot, you know, our ability to produce the materials, the c two b materials. The recall is pretty much complete now. So we think that’s gonna open things up quite a bit. Even in the next quarter. I mean I mean, even this quarter, I think. So we’ll see. We’ll see. You know, with aerospace, probably most industries, though, Chris, the demand is there, but you that the supply chain can’t turn everything on a dime.
We can, but there’s a lot of other, you know, steps along the way in the supply chain in order to be able to ramp up. Like with a three twenty, you know, we could support 75 airplanes a month at this point if they needed it, but and Airbus would like to be a 75 airplanes for a month. I’m quite sure of that. What’s holding you back is the supply chain. The supply chain is not able to turn on a dime.
Chris Showers: Okay. Thank you.
Brian Shore: Was there another question, Chris?
Chris Showers: No.
Brian Shore: Oh, good. Okay. Operator, anything else right now?
Operator: There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Shore for any closing comments.
Brian Shore: Okay. Well, Brian again here. Thank you very much for listening in. Sorry the call went so long. If you have any other questions, you wanna call us anytime. We’re happy to talk to you. Have a great day. Thank you. Bye.
Operator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your participation. This does conclude today’s teleconference. Please disconnect your lines, and have a wonderful day.
On October 7, 2025, Congress Park Capital LLC disclosed buying 10,764 shares of Invesco NASDAQ 100 ETF (QQQM), an estimated $2.54 million trade for the quarter.
According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission dated October 7, 2025, Congress Park Capital LLC increased its position in Invesco NASDAQ 100 ETF (QQQM) by 10,764 shares during Q3 2025. The estimated transaction value, based on the period’s average price, was $2.54 million. The fund reported holding 32,844 shares, worth $8.12 million.
This was a buy; QQQM now represents 2.5% of Congress Park Capital LLC’s 13F reportable assets under management.
Top holdings after the filing:
As of October 7, 2025, shares were priced at $248.85, up 25.4% over the past year, outperforming the S&P 500 by 8.0 percentage points
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Fund AUM | $64.34 billion |
| Price (as of October 7, 2025) | $248.85 |
| Distribution yield | 0.5% |
| 1-year total return | 25.4% |
Investment strategy: Seeks to track the performance of the Nasdaq-100 Index by investing at least 90% of assets in the underlying securities, providing exposure to 100 of the largest nonfinancial companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
Underlying holdings: The portfolio consists of securities from 100 of the largest nonfinancial companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market and has a non-diversified structure.
Expense ratio and structure: The fund operates as a passively managed ETF that tracks an index.
The Invesco NASDAQ 100 ETF (QQQM) offers investors targeted access to the Nasdaq-100 Index, representing some of the largest and most innovative nonfinancial companies traded on the Nasdaq exchange. The fund’s scale, with a market capitalization of $6.92 billion as of October 8, 2025, provides exposure to some of the largest nonfinancial companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange. By mirroring the index methodology and maintaining a transparent, rules-based approach, QQQM offers exposure to 100 of the largest nonfinancial companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Its disciplined strategy and non-diversified holdings reinforce its role as an index-tracking equity allocation.
Congress Park Capital increased its holdings in Invesco’s popular NASDAQ 100 ETF, which holds the 100 biggest nonfinancial companies in the NASDAQ, to nearly 33,000 shares worth over $8 million as of Q3 2025. This purchase of what amounts to an additional approximately 50% of the institution’s original holdings shows a great deal of conviction in the stock, and for good reason. It’s up 25% in the last year, and up over 107% over the last five years.
The tech-heavy NASDAQ has seen a lot of growth from companies across the spectrum, and much of its weight is currently coming from various AI plays. This includes chipmakers, software companies, and even AI startups that are looking for new ways to leverage the technology. In addition, public companies acting as Bitcoin holding companies are often members of the NASDAQ, and with the rapid increase in Bitcoin value, that’s certainly not hurt QQQM at all.
Investors seeking exposure to the NASDAQ who are looking to minimize downside risk may find what they’re looking for in QQQM, and Congress Park Capital has certainly indicated an interest in furthering its investment in the stock with this purchase.
ETF: Exchange-Traded Fund; a fund that trades on stock exchanges and holds a basket of securities.
13F reportable AUM: Assets under management that must be disclosed in quarterly SEC Form 13F filings by institutional investment managers.
Assets under management (AUM): The total market value of investments managed on behalf of clients by a fund or firm.
Dividend yield: Annual dividends paid by an investment divided by its current price, expressed as a percentage.
Total return: The investment’s price change plus all dividends and distributions, assuming those payouts are reinvested.
Index-tracking: An investment strategy aiming to replicate the performance of a specific market index.
Non-diversified structure: A fund that invests in a limited number of securities, increasing exposure to individual holdings.
Expense ratio: The annual fee, as a percentage of assets, that a fund charges to cover operating expenses.
Passively managed: A fund management style that seeks to mirror an index rather than actively select securities.
Underlying securities: The individual stocks or assets that make up an ETF or fund’s portfolio.
Outperforming: Achieving a higher return than a benchmark or comparable investment over a specified period.
Rules-based approach: An investment strategy that follows predetermined, systematic criteria for selecting and weighting securities.
USA Rare Earth shareholders just got news that could potentially power an extended rally.
USA Rare Earth (USAR 14.99%) posted huge gains in Thursday’s trading session. The deep-sea mining specialist’s share price gained 15%, even though the Dow Jones Industrial Average index declined 0.6% in the day’s trading. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 declined 0.3%, and the Nasdaq Composite declined 0.1%.
The key factors that pushed the broader market lower today were the same ones that powered big gains for USA Rare Earth stock. China plans to cut down on its export of rare-earth minerals to the U.S., but that could present a big opportunity for USA Rare Earth.
Image source: Getty Images.
China is the world’s leading supplier of rare-earth minerals. According to some estimates, the country accounts for approximately 70% of global rare-earth mineral sourcing. If relations between the U.S. and China continue to worsen, the U.S. will likely have to increase its domestic sourcing of rare-earth minerals and trade in the category with aligned countries.
USA Rare Earth’s business is still in a pre-revenue state, and that makes the company a risky investment almost by definition. This characteristic makes it riskier than more well-established mining stocks. Conversely, the company expects to begin production at its Stillwater, Oklahoma, magnet facility next year and has other projects that could shift into production mode within the next two years.
USA Rare Earth continues to be a high-risk investment, and the stock is too growth-dependent to be a good fit for risk-averse investors. On the other hand, the company’s potential to play a leading role in supplying rare-earth minerals to the U.S. makes it a potentially explosive play.
Keith Noonan has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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Tilray Brands surged after posting stronger-than-expected quarterly results and renewed optimism around U.S. cannabis reform.
Tilray Brands Inc (TLRY 21.51%) rose 22.09% to close at $2.10 after reporting better-than-expected fiscal first-quarter results. Trading volume reached 297.6 million shares, about four times its three-month average of 71 million. In intraday trading, the company reached a new 52-week high of $2.32.
The S&P 500 (^GSPC -0.28%) slipped 0.28% to 6,735.11, while the Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC -0.08%) also edged lower as investors rotated toward smaller growth and speculative names.
Peers in the cannabis sector advanced alongside Tilray. Canopy Growth Corp (CGC 7.84%) gained 7.84% closing at $1.65, and SNDL Inc (SNDL 7.03%) added 7.03% closing at $2.82, both supported by stronger sentiment for U.S. cannabis policy changes.
Tilray’s earnings, released before the open, showed net revenue of $209.5 million, up 5% year-over-year, and net income of $1.5 million, reversing a prior loss. Margins narrowed slightly, but the company improved cash flow and reaffirmed its full-year profitability outlook, helping bolster confidence in its ongoing diversification strategy beyond cannabis.
Market data sourced from Google Finance and Yahoo! Finance on Thursday, Oct. 9, 2025.
Daily Stock News has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. This article was generated with GPT-5, OpenAI’s large-scale language generation model and has been reviewed by The Motley Fool’s AI quality control systems. The Motley Fool recommends SNDL and Tilray Brands. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Amazon released a new Agentic AI platform.
UiPath has made agentic AI automation a central focus.
The company also announced several new partnerships last week.
Shares of UiPath (NYSE: PATH) are soaring on Wednesday, up 19.3% as of 3:45 p.m. ET. The jump comes as the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.4% and 0.2%, respectively.
The software and automation company’s stock is getting a lift from buzz surrounding Agentic artificial intelligence (AI) just a week after announcing new partnerships with some heavy hitters in AI like OpenAI.
Where to invest $1,000 right now? Our analyst team just revealed what they believe are the 10 best stocks to buy right now. Continue »
Amazon launched its Amazon Quick Suite through its Amazon Web Services (AWS), which it says is the “agentic AI application reshaping how work gets done.” The platform brings together a host of automation and agentic AI tools, making them easier to use. The news helped boost positive sentiment around agentic AI, a core focus of UiPath, lifting the company’s shares.
This comes just a week after UiPath announced that it was teaming up with several major AI players, including OpenAI, Nvidia, and Snowflake.
Image source: Getty Images.
While the news has been positive over the past few weeks, UiPath’s valuation is just too high to recommend buying UiPath shares. Its price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) is north of 400, making it incredibly expensive and priced for perfection. I would avoid the stock.
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Johnny Rice has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Nvidia, Snowflake, and UiPath. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Franklin Street Advisors disclosed an exit from Intuitive Surgical (ISRG -0.92%) in its latest SEC filing for the quarter ended September 30, selling 42,601 shares for an estimated $23.2 million.
According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission released on Thursday, Franklin Street Advisors sold its entire holding in Intuitive Surgical, divesting 42,601 shares. The estimated value of the transaction, calculated using the average market price during the quarter, was approximately $23.2 million.
Franklin Street Advisors’ Intuitive Surgical position previously comprised 1.4% of the fund’s 13F assets.
Top holdings after the filing:
As of Thursday afternoon, shares of Intuitive Surgical were priced at $443.87, down 9.5% over the past year and underperforming the S&P 500’s 16% gain.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Price (as of Thursday afternoon) | $443.87 |
| Market Capitalization | $159.1 billion |
| Revenue (TTM) | $9.1 billion |
| Net Income (TTM) | $2.6 billion |
Intuitive Surgical, Inc. develops, manufactures, and markets products that enable physicians and healthcare providers to enhance the quality of, and access to, minimally invasive care in the United States and internationally. Its strategic focus on innovation and expanding procedure adoption underpins its long-term growth trajectory.
Franklin Street Advisors’ $23.2 million sale of its entire Intuitive Surgical position marks a clear step back from the medical robotics firm after a volatile year for the stock. Shares have fallen more than 25% from their all-time high in January, as investors weigh valuation concerns and new tariff-related risks that management warned could trim 2025 margins by about 1 percentage point.
In its second-quarter 2025 earnings, Intuitive posted revenue of $2.4 billion, up 21% year-over-year, with worldwide da Vinci procedure volume climbing 17%. Meanwhile, GAAP net income rose 25% to $658 million ($1.81 per share). Yet even with expanding adoption, tightening gross margins—driven by higher input costs and tariffs on components from Mexico, Germany, and China—tempered enthusiasm.
CEO Dave Rosa said Intuitive remains “committed to advancing care” and expanding access to minimally invasive surgery worldwide. But after a multi-year run-up, Franklin’s decision to take profits may signal growing caution among institutional investors who see near-term headwinds outpacing the company’s impressive long-term growth story.
13F reportable assets: Assets that institutional investment managers must disclose quarterly to the SEC, showing their holdings in U.S. publicly traded securities.
Assets under management (AUM): The total market value of investments that a fund or firm manages on behalf of clients.
Full exit: When an investor sells all shares of a particular holding, eliminating exposure to that asset.
Stake: The amount of ownership or investment a fund or individual holds in a company or asset.
Filing: An official document submitted to a regulatory authority, such as the SEC, to disclose financial or operational information.
Divesting: Selling off an asset or investment, often to reduce risk or change portfolio strategy.
Minimally invasive surgery: Surgical procedures performed through small incisions, often using specialized instruments or robotic systems.
Installed base: The total number of a company’s products currently in use by customers.
Service contracts: Agreements for ongoing maintenance, support, or services related to products sold.
Procedure adoption: The rate at which new medical procedures or technologies are implemented by healthcare providers.
TTM: The 12-month period ending with the most recent quarterly report.
Jonathan Ponciano has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Intuitive Surgical, Microsoft, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
Franklin Street Advisors disclosed in a Thursday regulatory filing that it sold Salesforce shares in an estimated $19.6 million transaction during the third quarter.
According to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing released Thursday, Franklin Street Advisors sold 77,826 shares of Salesforce (CRM 1.97%) in the third quarter. The estimated transaction value was $19.6 million based on the average share price for the period ended September 30. Following the sale, the fund held 1,924 shares, with a reported value of $455,988 at quarter’s end.
The sale reduced the Salesforce stake to just 0.03% of Franklin Street Advisors’ 13F reportable assets under management as of September 30.
Top holdings after the filing:
As of Thursday afternoon, Salesforce shares were priced at $244.73, down 15% over the past year, far underperforming the S&P 500 by 31 percentage points during the same period.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Revenue (TTM) | $39.5 billion |
| Net Income (TTM) | $6.7 billion |
| Dividend Yield | 0.7% |
| Price (as of Thursday afternoon) | $244.73 |
Salesforce, Inc. is a global leader in CRM software, leveraging a comprehensive suite of cloud-based applications to drive digital transformation for its clients. Its scale and broad product portfolio reinforce its position in the enterprise software market. The company’s strategy centers on deepening customer engagement and expanding its platform ecosystem to maintain market leadership and sustain long-term growth.
Franklin Street Advisors’ decision to nearly liquidate its Salesforce position—with a $19.6 million sale reducing holdings to just 0.03% of assets—reflects a sharp pivot away from one of tech’s weaker performers this year. Salesforce shares are down 15% over the past 12 months, while the fund’s top holdings—NVIDIA, Microsoft, Apple, Alphabet, and Amazon—have each notched double-digit gains, underscoring the widening divide between AI winners and software incumbents still proving their growth story.
In its latest quarterly earnings release, Salesforce reported revenue of $10.2 billion, up 10% year-over-year, and a GAAP operating margin of 22.8%, its 10th straight quarter of margin expansion. Net income climbed to $1.9 billion, or $1.96 per share, as strong demand for Data Cloud and AI offerings lifted recurring revenue. However, investors have grown cautious amid slowing overall growth and mounting competition in enterprise AI integration.
CEO Marc Benioff called the quarter “outstanding,” highlighting the company’s vision for “agentic enterprises” blending human and AI workflows. Yet with steep competition, Salesforce may need to show faster innovation—and reignite investor enthusiasm—to reclaim its former momentum.
13F reportable assets: Assets that institutional investment managers must report quarterly to the SEC, showing their holdings.
Assets under management (AUM): The total market value of investments managed on behalf of clients by a fund or firm.
Transaction value: The total dollar amount received or paid in a specific buy or sell of securities.
Stake: The portion or percentage of ownership an investor or fund holds in a company.
Top holdings: The largest investments in a fund’s portfolio, typically ranked by market value.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Software and strategies used by companies to manage interactions with customers and prospects.
Platform ecosystem: The network of products, services, and partners built around a company’s core software platform.
Dividend yield: The annual dividend payment divided by the stock’s current price, expressed as a percentage.
TTM: The 12-month period ending with the most recent quarterly report.
Jonathan Ponciano has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Salesforce. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
A fan who spent hundreds of dollars for tickets to what he thought would be one of LeBron James’ final NBA games is looking to recoup the money in small claims court after it turned out “The Second Deicision” teased by the Lakers superstar had nothing to do with his retirement.
Norwalk resident Andrew Garcia filed a claim Tuesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court that states that James owes him $865.66 because of “fraud, deception, misrepresentation, and any and all basis of legal recovery.”
Garcia told The Times that he spent that amount for two tickets to the Lakers’ game against the Cleveland Cavaliers on March 31, 2026, at Crypto.com Arena , thinking it would be the 40-year-old NBA icon’s final game against the team that drafted him in 2003.
He and other basketball fans were under that impression after James posted Monday on X that he would be announcing “the decision of all decisions” the next day. The post included a video clip teasing “The Second Decision,” a clear reference to 2010’s “The Decision,” in which James famously announced he was going to “take my talents to South Beach” to play for the Miami Heat.
Garcia said he purchased the tickets within 10 minutes of James’ social media post.
“I was like, ‘Holy s—, LeBron is going to retire! We’ve got to get tickets now,’” the 29-year-old Garcia said. “Like, literally, because if he formally makes this announcement, you know, there’s gonna be some significant price changes, right?”
Garcia is a huge fan of the Lakers and James, as well as an avid basketball fan in general, so he thought it would be cool to see the NBA’s all-time leading scorer play for the last time against the team with which he started his career and brought its first title in 2016 after his return from Miami.
“Moments like that, I understand the value,” Garcia said. “There still may be some moderate value [to the tickets], however it’s not the same without him retiring. I remember Kobe’s last year, it was kind of what this would have been, per se, where every ticket was worth a lot. Every game had value. …
“I missed out on that. I was a little bit younger at the time. I obviously wasn’t in a position to where I could just buy tickets unfortunately at that age. I believe I was like 18 or 19 at the time. And that’s one of my biggest regrets as a sports fan. I really wish I could have gotten the Kobe’s last year. So I see this as a potential to kind of make up for what I lost with Kobe.”
But “The Second Decision” ended up having nothing to do with retirement. It was merely a Hennessy ad.
So now Garcia wants his money back.
“There is no circumstance absent him saying he’s gonna retire that I would have bought tickets that far in advance,” Garcia said. “I mean, I buy tickets, but I don’t buy tickets five months’ advance. I’m the kind of person that buys tickets five hours in advance. It was solely, solely, solely based on that. So that’s why I was really thinking, ‘You know what, this might be grounds for a case.’ ”
The Times reached out to an attorney said to be working with James related to the claim but did not receive an immediate response.
In light of everything that has happened this week, though, Garcia said he’d still be willing to pay the same amount of money to see James play during his eventual retirement tour.
“Of course,” Garcia said. “I would probably spend more, because life is all about memories and experiences.”
In a filing dated Oct. 6, 2025, Kawa Capital Management, Inc reported buying 340,000 additional shares of Vale (VALE) during the third quarter of 2025, bringing its total holding to 1,020,000 shares. The estimated value of shares acquired was $3.47 million, based on the average share price for the period. For further details, see the SEC filing.
This was a buy; after the trade, Vale represented 20.1% of Kawa Capital’s 13F assets under management as of September 30, 2025
Top holdings after the filing:
NYSE:BDN: $16.36 million (29.7% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
NYSE:ONL: $14.78 million (26.8% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
NYSE:VALE: $11,08 million (20.1% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
NYSE:GGB: $6.49 million (11.8% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
NYSE:DK: $6.45 million (11.7% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
As of October 3, 2025, shares were priced at $11.01, underperforming the S&P 500 by 17.08 percentage points over the year ended October 3, 2025
Vale reported trailing twelve-month revenue of $36,080,663,000 and net income of $5,166,767,000 for the period ended June 30, 2025
Over the past 12 months, Vale shareholders eaned a 3.38% dividend yield. The stock was 3.3% below its 52-week high as of October 6, 2025.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Revenue (TTM) | $36.08 billion |
| Net Income (TTM) | $5.17 billion |
| Dividend Yield | 3.38% |
| Price (as of market close 2025-10-03) | $11.01 |
Vale S.A. generates revenue primarily from the production and sale of iron ore, iron ore pellets, nickel, and copper, with additional contributions from gold, silver, cobalt, and other by-products.
The company operates an integrated business model, extracting and processing minerals and providing related logistics services, enabling efficient delivery to global industrial customers.
Vale serves a broad global customer base through its scale and logistics capabilities.
Vale maintains a diversified portfolio that supports the energy transition and industrial materials sectors, operating at scale and providing integrated logistics services to customers worldwide.
The Brazillian mining giant is famous for producing products you need to produce batteries, copper, maganese, and cobalt. It’s also a top producer of iron, and nickel.
Unlike U.S. companies that usually pay even quarterly dividends, Vale distributes dividend payments twice a year. Fluctuating currency exchange rates and basic material prices have made its dividend payout highly variable. This isn’t an appropriate stock for investors seeking a steadily growing stream of passive income.
In the second quarter, iron ore production rose 4% year over year. Unfortunately, the average realized iron ore fines price was 13% lower year over year.
Second quarter copper production rose 18% year over year and efficiency is way up. In July, management revised its all-in copper cost guidance to a range between $1,500 and $2,000 per ton. The previous range was between $2,800 and $3,300 per ton.
AUM (Assets Under Management): The total market value of investments managed by a fund or investment firm.
13F: A quarterly report filed by institutional investment managers to disclose their equity holdings to the SEC.
Dividend yield: Annual dividend payments divided by the stock’s current price, expressed as a percentage.
Trailing twelve months (TTM): Financial data covering the most recent 12 consecutive months.
Integrated business model: A company structure where multiple stages of production and distribution are managed within the same organization.
Iron ore pellets: Small, rounded balls of iron ore used as raw material in steel production.
Point-in-time metric: A measurement taken at a specific date, not averaged over a period.
Buy (in fund context): The purchase of additional shares or securities by an investment fund or manager.
Reportable assets: Investments that must be disclosed in regulatory filings due to size or type.
Underperforming: Delivering a lower return compared to a benchmark or index over a given period.
Energy transition: The global shift from fossil fuels to renewable and low-carbon energy sources.
Logistics services: The management of transporting and delivering goods efficiently to customers or markets.
Nuclear reactor builder Oklo (OKLO -0.13%) stock jumped 2.4% through 11:25 a.m. ET Thursday.
For that, you can thank the friendly analysts at Canaccord Genuity.
Image source: Getty Images.
Canaccord Genuity initiated coverage of nuclear company Oklo with a buy rating and a $175 price target on this $137 stock, as StreetInsider.com reports today. That may sound like a high price for a start-up with no revenue that isn’t expected to have revenue for another couple years, nor earn its first profit before 2030. But here’s the thing:
Canaccord isn’t thinking about 2030 here. It’s looking much farther out, with “our model stretching to 2050.”
Peering 25 years into the future, Canaccord sees “a new nuclear age emerging; one where nuclear assets grow not only in volume but as a percentage of the global energy mix.” Canaccord expects Oklo to play an outsize role in this future. “Vertically integrated,” boasting a “deftly constructed strategy” for rolling out small nuclear plants, and good “technology capabilities,” Canaccord is placing a bet on Oklo not just surviving until 2030, but going on to profit from the new nuclear renaissance.
What makes Canaccord so confident about Oklo? With $530 million in the bank and a $53 million cash burn rate, it looks at first glance like Oklo has all the money it needs (and more) to last until profits arrive in 2030.
Problem is, most analysts think Oklo’s cash burn will accelerate dramatically as it approaches commercialization (and profit). Cash consumption over the next five years could actually reach $1.5 billion, which is more than Oklo has handy just right now.
Bright as its future looks, Oklo still needs to come up with even more cash, or else it will go bust.
Rich Smith has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
China’s trade war with the U.S. is long-term good news for USA Rare Earth stock. It’s the short term that’s worrying.
USA Rare Earth (USAR 17.77%) stock, one of a handful of start-up companies attempting to jump-start rare earth oxide mining and rare earth magnet manufacturing in the United States, soared 15.6% through 10:45 a.m. ET Thursday. And why?
China just announced new curbs on rare earth exports.
Image source: Getty Images.
The Chinese Commerce Ministry announced Thursday that government approval will be required for exporting products containing certain rare earth metals. China dominates global mining of rare earths (69% of global production), refining of rare earth oxides (85%), and manufacture of rare earth magnets (90%) — the end goal of all this work.
For more than a decade, China has used its near-monopolies in rare earths as a lever in trade negotiations, especially with the United States. In the context of President Trump’s hefty tariffs imposed on other Chinese exports, China’s once again limiting rare earth exports to punish the U.S.
Perversely, that’s good news for a company like USA Rare Earth, which aims to produce more of this stuff domestically to fill gaps in the supply line that the lack of Chinese exports creates.
It’s good news long term, that is. In the short term, even a full-scale Chinese embargo on rare earth exports won’t change the fact that USA Rare Earth has no revenue and is losing about $100 million a year.
Analysts do believe the company will earn a profit eventually, but no sooner than 2028. By that time, however, the Trump administration will be heading for the exits, the trade war could be over, and rare earth exports from China could be flowing freely again.
Buying USA Rare Earth stock years before it turns profitable remains highly speculative. Caveat investor, and limit your risks.
Rich Smith has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
By AP with Doloresz Katanich
Published on
09/10/2025 – 16:44 GMT+2
Traders on Wall Street showed caution on Thursday morning although US stocks continue to hover near their record highs.
The S&P 500 rose 0.1% in the first few minutes of trading on Thursday, before slipping 0.35%. The index is coming off its eighth gain in the last nine days.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.41%, and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.43%, following a tech rally that kept US markets in a good mood over recent weeks. On Wednesday, AI chip giant Nvidia and the tech-heavy Nasdaq index both hit new records.
However, the rally has been increasingly accompanied by a growing chorus of concerns that AI-related investments are overpriced. On Wednesday, the Bank of England and the IMF both issued warnings about growing risks of an AI-led market bubble bursting. The announcements add to the current uncertainty due to the shutdown in the US, among others.
“Concerns around excessive valuations, elevated levels of government borrowing, uncertain economic growth, and political turbulence are omnipresent,” said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell.
“There are a multitude of factors that could trigger a market pullback, but for now, it is another day where there are more bulls than bears.”
In other corporate news, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the world’s largest contract chipmaker, on Thursday reported its third-quarter revenue climbed 30% year-on-year, beating market forecasts.
“There is no real sign of a slowdown in AI-driven demand in the latest numbers from TSMC,” Mould said. “The chip manufacturing giant may have seen a slight easing in demand month-on-month, but year-on-year the levels of growth are still impressive for a company of its size.”
Trading has been relatively muted recently following the US government’s latest shutdown. The closure is delaying the release of several major economic reports that usually move the market. Stocks have been drifting without them or other signals to change expectations for cuts to interest rates by the Federal Reserve, one of the major reasons the stock market has been on a tear since April.
Oil prices fell after Israel and Hamas agreed Wednesday to pause fighting in Gaza so that the remaining hostages there can be freed in the coming days in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
The acceptance of elements of a plan put forward by the Trump administration represents the biggest breakthrough in months in the devastating two-year war.
US benchmark crude dipped 21 cents to $62.34 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, edged down 18 cents to $66.07 per barrel.
Gold shed some of its stellar gains but was still at $4,054.50 per ounce as of Thursday morning in the US.
PepsiCo shares inched up over 1% on Thursday after the snack and beverage giant reported better-than-expected revenue in the third quarter despite weaker demand for its snacks and drinks in North America.
PepsiCo’s net income fell 11% to $2.6 billion (€2.24bn), but adjusted for one-time items, the company earned $2.29 per share, beating analysts’ forecasts by 3 cents.
Delta Air Lines easily topped Wall Street expectations for third-quarter profit. Delta expects recent momentum to carry through the end of the year and forecasts full-year profit of $6 per share, in the upper half of its previous guidance range. Delta shares rose 5.8% in premarket, lifting other major airlines’ shares along with it. United rose 3.9% and American jumped 4.9%.
Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk, the maker of weight-loss drug Wegovy, announced that it was acquiring San Francisco’s Akero Therapeutics for $4.7bn (€4.05bn) in cash.
Meanwhile, Ferrari saw its shares lose more than 13.8% after the Italian luxury sports carmaker offered a cautious earnings forecast on Thursday.
Elsewhere, European markets opened in a mixed mood as traders weighed the details of the Israel–Hamas peace deal and mounting concerns over an AI bubble, with corporate updates, the looming US shutdown, and France’s political turmoil humming in the background.
Germany’s DAX added 0.28% while France’s CAC 40 was mostly flat. Britain’s FTSE 100 fell 0.29%.
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FORT WASHINGTON, Pa. — Amtech Software, the leading software platform for the packaging industry, today announced key additions to its leadership team as the company accelerates innovation, expands its product portfolio, and enhances customer success initiatives.
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With strong backing and continued investment, Amtech is doubling down on innovation, customer success, and operational excellence to support its global packaging customers. The new appointments strengthen Amtech’s leadership team to scale, while maintaining continuity of its mission and culture. These additions reflect the company’s commitment to growth and customer-first innovation.
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“Amtech is entering an exciting new chapter, and I remain focused on helping our customers grow their businesses,”
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said Chuck Schneider, CEO of Amtech Software. “
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Our commitment to growth and customer support has required us to expand our existing leadership team. Each of these leaders was carefully chosen for their experience, expertise, and ability to help us scale. Together, they bring the right mix of vision and execution to accelerate our vision and ensure customers remain at the heart of everything we do.”
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Leadership Additions to Amtech Software
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Vinod Kumar – Chief People & Culture Officer
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Amtech Software appointed Vinod Kumar as Chief People & Culture Officer, underscoring the company’s commitment to expanding its team and investing in a strong people and culture foundation.
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Kumar brings over 20 years of international HR leadership experience, having led talent strategy, employee engagement, and organizational transformation at private equity-backed and multinational software companies. Most recently, he served as Chief Human Resources Officer at Khoros, where he oversaw global talent development
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At Amtech, Vinod will lead the development of a global talent strategy, shape a high-performance culture, and strengthen Amtech’s ability to scale as a global enterprise. In addition to his global talent role, he is responsible for overseeing and building out Amtech’s operations in India.
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Vinod holds a bachelor’s degree in business management from Bangalore University and a Postgraduate Certificate in Human Resources Management from XLRI, Jamshedpur.
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“Amtech’s future depends on the strength of our people and the culture we build together. I’m passionate about creating an environment where our teams can thrive and deliver their very best to our customers,” said Vinod Kumar
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Kostas Vassilakis – SVP, Technology
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Amtech Software has appointed Kostas Vassilakis as Senior Vice President of Technology as part of a strategic reorganization to strengthen its product and technology focus. To maximize growth, Amtech has split its product and technology functions: Danna Nelson, SVP of Products, will lead product strategy and customer insight, while Kostas will drive technology innovation, cloud migration, security, and AI capabilities.
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Vassilakis is a senior technology executive with more than 30 years of experience leading digital transformation and platform modernization. He has held leadership roles at PartsTech, Roofstock, Chewy, and Staples, where he delivered large-scale SaaS programs, built global engineering organizations, and ensured best-in-class system resilience and availability.
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He holds advanced degrees in Computer Science from Yale University and Applied Mathematics from Carnegie Mellon University, and a B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Crete.
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At Amtech, Kostas will focus on scaling product delivery and building a world-class technology team to deliver expanded capabilities to customers worldwide. His commitment to building upon the company’s engineering excellence will help drive Amtech’s innovation, cloud migration, security, and AI capabilities even further.
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“The packaging industry is transforming rapidly, and technology is at the heart of that change. I’m excited to lead Amtech’s efforts in cloud, security, and AI so that our customers can be more agile, efficient, and competitive,” said Kostas Vassilakis
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Cory King – SVP, Customer Operations
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Amtech Software also welcomed Cory King as Senior Vice President of Customer Operations, reinforcing its commitment to delivering best-in-class support and services for its global customer base.
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King brings more than 20 years of experience managing customer operations across the Americas, EMEA, and Asia-Pacific, having held senior roles at Aptean, Finastra, FIS, and Oracle.
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In his new role, King will oversee the refinement of Amtech’s customer operations framework, focusing on integrating teams, processes, and technology to enhance client value and support sustainable growth. He will also build out a dedicated customer success group to deliver an exceptional experience to Amtech customers worldwide.
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“Customers are at the heart of Amtech’s mission. My focus is on building strong, scalable operations that ensure every customer interaction adds value and strengthens long-term partnerships,” said Cory King
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Joe Buckley – Director of Strategic Programs
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Amtech appointed Joe Buckley as Director of Strategic Programs, reinforcing its focus on execution excellence and disciplined growth. Joe brings a diverse background in strategy and transformation, having developed high-performing teams and guided organizations through complex business challenges. His work has centered on driving growth, leading transformation initiatives, and improving performance through data-driven strategies
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Prior to Amtech, Joe served at Boston Consulting Group, advising public and commercial clients on digital, technology, and business transformation. Earlier in his career, he was a U.S. Navy Submarine Officer, with tours aboard the USS Alaska and in staff roles within the Office of Legislative Affairs.
If you’ve ever scrolled through financial advice online, you’ve probably seen the same magic number pop up again and again: $1 million. That’s the supposed “gold standard” for retirement that will buy you peace of mind, freedom, and maybe a beach house.
But the reality is almost none of us actually get there.
According to the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances, only about 2.5% of all Americans have $1 million or more tucked away in retirement accounts. And among people who’ve already retired, only 3.2% hit that milestone.
Many Americans think they’ll need about $1.5 million to retire comfortably, according to Northwestern Mutual’s 2024 Planning & Progress Study. That’s a realistic number given rising costs, longer lifespans, and the fact that Social Security alone doesn’t stretch nearly as far as it used to.
But if half the country doesn’t even have a retirement account, that million-dollar dream starts to look more like a fantasy. The Fed’s data shows that only 54.3% of households even have retirement accounts at all. That means almost half of Americans are heading into their later years without any dedicated savings.
Among those who do have accounts, the median balance is around $87,000. That’s a decent start, but not nearly enough to live off for 20 or 30 years.
It’s not always a story of bad decisions. A lot of it comes down to timing, access, and financial pressures.
Many workers don’t get access to employer retirement plans like 401(k)s. Others start saving late because they’re paying off student loans or dealing with high rent and childcare costs. And even when people do save, inflation and volatile markets can eat away at progress.
There’s also the simple math of compound growth: the earlier you start, the easier it is to hit big numbers. For example, someone investing $500 a month from age 25 could end up with around $1 million by 65 (assuming a 7% annual return). But start at 40, and you’d need to save nearly triple that every month to catch up.
If your retirement savings aren’t where you want them to be, you’re in good company, and you still have options.
If you’re 50 or older, the IRS lets you contribute more to your retirement accounts. In 2025, that’s an extra $7,500 to your 401(k) and $1,000 to your IRA beyond the standard limits. Here are some of the best IRAs you can open — start saving for your retirement today.
If your company matches contributions, take full advantage. It’s basically free money. For instance, if you make $70,000 and contribute 6% to your 401(k), a 50% match means your employer chips in another $2,100 per year with no strings attached.
The easiest way to build momentum is to set up automatic contributions. You’ll never “forget” to save, and you won’t miss money that never hits your checking account. You can earn around 4.00% APY with the best high-yield savings accounts available today.
There’s a reason people pay for help with their retirement planning. It can seem overwhelming and be hard to know exactly where to start. Luckily, this no-cost quiz from our partner, SmartAsset, makes it easier to find a fiduciary financial advisor. Get on top of your retirement savings today.
Sure, $1 million sounds nice. But what really matters is income in retirement — not just a lump sum. Social Security, part-time work, or rental income can all fill the gaps.
The key is consistency. Whether you’re starting with $100 or $10,000, saving regularly and investing smartly can put you in a much stronger position over time.
Only one of these coins has a real investment thesis for now.
XRP (XRP -1.75%) was built as payment scaffolding. Dogecoin (DOGE -1.09%) is the meme coin that keeps surprising people who bet against popular culture. These coins couldn’t be more different.
Both have posted big multiyear gains and made some investors into millionaires, with Dogecoin being the clear five-year standout, up by an absurd 9,780% compared to XRP’s gain of 1,090%. But if your goal is long-term wealth-building from here on out rather than an outrageously risky thrill ride, there’s a clear winner between these two. There are no guarantees in the world of investing or crypto, but let’s investigate which of these coins is more likely to still be a millionaire maker.
Image source: Getty Images.
XRP’s core goal is to serve financial institutions and payment businesses across a handful of different functions.
Its chain, the XRPL, originally a platform for doing quick and cheap money transfers, is now a place where users can park value in stablecoins, process payments, access liquidity for settling trades in the traditional or cryptocurrency markets, and generate a yield from real-world assets (RWAs) like U.S. Treasuries.
Ripple, the company that issues XRP, has a go-to-market strategy that’s making the most of that architecture. Ripple recently secured a key license to offer regulated crypto payments in Dubai, a major international financial hub, and it has already onboarded a few clients after getting the approval.
It’s also in the process of getting similar permissions in many other global financial hubs so as to increase the chain’s addressable market. And securing that regulatory clarity to create bank-grade on-ramps to its network is exactly what institutional users require to commit real volumes and workflows.
The coin’s tokenomics and supply also support the long-term thesis for an investment. XRP’s maximum supply is 100 billion, which is gradually being released from escrow at regular intervals. Thus, investors won’t get their value significantly diluted over time.
But could the coin make investors millions?
Its market cap is currently upward of $180.2 billion. For that to dramatically increase, XRP would need to process a large portion of the global money transfer market, as well as onboard billions of capital from the traditional financial sector for management on the XRPL. It’s certainly possible for those things to happen, but only over a protracted period of time, and in the absence of strong competition. That means that you should not bet on it happening.
Dogecoin’s edge is its mindshare, which is unparalleled among meme coins and certainly one of the largest in the crypto sector in general.
In risk-on markets, it can rally sharply as attention snowballs, sometimes outpacing projects with vastly richer fundamentals, like XRP. While there’s no utility to owning Dogecoin, that hasn’t stopped it from gaining in value over time. In some sense, it’s that very property which keeps investors coming back for more, even though its crashes can be even more frightening than its run-ups are thrilling.
One big fly in the ointment is that its supply issuance schedule is bad for holders over the long term. A fixed 5 billion new DOGE are issued per year, so holders see their value consistently diluted. There is no hard cap on the coin’s total issuance; the value proposition, to the extent that there is one, therefore leans more on the coin’s culture remaining in vogue.
The challenge is thus durably creating and capturing economic value beyond periodic hype. Discussions about adding deeper utility have persisted for years in Dogecoin’s developer community, but most monetization pathways remain tentative compared to chains that already serve institutional workflows. In other words, Dogecoin can absolutely surge when big-picture trends are permissive and attention is high, but sustaining those gains without a hard cap or a cemented set of real-economy uses is harder.
If you’re looking for long-term compounding, predictable issuance without a ceiling is a structural headwind relative to capped-supply assets. That does not preclude strong runs, but it does raise the bar for calling it a millionaire maker from here.
Realistically, neither of these assets is likely to mint new millionaires from small stakes, as both are already quite large and probably can’t grow by the 100x that’d be necessary to really make new investors rich. But if you forced me to choose the more likely millionaire maker from today’s levels, and to say which I think would be the better asset for building wealth, I would pick XRP by a mile for both.
It has a clearer path to sustained, non-speculative demand via payments plumbing, bank-friendly regulatory compliance controls, and growing regulatory footholds, all of which are paired with a defined supply regime that won’t dilute holders’ value.
In contrast, Dogecoin has the bigger five-year highlight reel and can (and probably will) still pop impressively in risk-on periods, but its open-ended supply and still-nascent utility make it less likely to reliably compound in value over time. So consider an investment in XRP — but keep it small as you diversify your portfolio into more traditional investments — and hold off on even thinking about Dogecoin until it can offer some real utility, if it ever does.
To call Opendoor‘s (NASDAQ: OPEN) recent stock performance strong would be an understatement. However, the real estate disruptor’s stock is starting to remind me of the 2021 meme stock craze, and not in a good way.
*Stock prices used were the morning prices of Oct. 2, 2025. The video was published on Oct. 3, 2025.
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Matt Frankel has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Matthew Frankel is an affiliate of The Motley Fool and may be compensated for promoting its services. If you choose to subscribe through their link they will earn some extra money that supports their channel. Their opinions remain their own and are unaffected by The Motley Fool.