Toyota
After the news comes out, we'll have time aplenty to dissect it. But before we begin obsessing over Toyota's short-term progress, let's take a moment to review what investors think about it as a long-term investment. Our tool in this endeavor: Motley Fool CAPS, where we poll more than 28,000 investors for their views on well over 4,000 companies, Toyota among them. Here's what Fools have to say about the company.
Up or down?
More than 1,700 investors have submitted opinions on Toyota. The verdict: Oh, what a feeling!
CAPS investors are nearly unanimous in their love for this company: 98% of players overall expect Toyota to outperform the market. Among CAPS All-Stars, that sentiment rises to 99%. That's more than enough to give this stock the highest possible CAPS rating, five stars.
Among its peer automakers on CAPS, Toyota ties for first place:
|
Major Auto Manufacturers Group |
|
|---|---|
|
Toyota |
***** |
|
Honda |
***** |
|
Tata Motors |
***** |
|
Fiat |
**** |
|
DaimlerChrysler |
* |
|
Ford |
* |
|
General Motors |
* |
Wall Street vs. Main Street
You know the 1%-2% endorsement that Toyota lost on Main Street? It found it on Wall Street. Among professional investors tracked by CAPS, the company gets a unanimous five out of five outperform ratings -- which is interesting when you notice that the company has actually underperformed the S&P 500 by nearly 14% over the last 52 weeks.
Bull pitch
Market share, profits, reputation for quality -- when it comes to Toyota, a bull has many horns on which to hang his hat.
Meanwhile, the No. 1 investor in all of CAPS-land gives Toyota the thumbs-up for another reason entirely: fuel economy, and the hybrid gas-electric engine: "Hybrids can leverage the existing infrastructure, and actually reduce overall energy consumption needs. Furthermore, hybrid technology is still in the very early stages and I expect greater and greater efficiency from this technology into the future. I'm long on Toyota here (and also long on Honda) because of their leadership in the hybrid automobile market. Unlike the rest of the alternative energy hopefuls, I think this technology is the wave of the future, and I'm willing to put my CAPS jester cap on the line and place a bet on the market leaders."
Bear pitch
For a stock that's lagged the S&P 500 badly over the last year, Toyota has remarkably few detractors on CAPS. One of the few bears willing to raise his head -- and point out that the emperor has no share price momentum -- observes: "TM has had things all their way for the past five years. Think that will continue for the next five? I don't. Products are not favorably differentiated in today's market. I will give them the quality credit they deserve during the last decade, but others have caught their quality and offer more compelling products."
Who said that?
To learn the identities of the wise Fools who penned these thoughts, and explore the plethora of additional financial data we've put together on the company, just click here.
Fool contributor Rich Smith does not own shares of any company named above. You can find him on CAPS, publicly pontificating under the handle TMFDitty, where he's currently ranked No. 830 out of more than 28,000 raters.
