Is there one stock, you ask, that best optimizes an investor's participation in the rapidly changing world of efficient energy supply and consumption, and by doing so, effectively serves the worlds of oil and gas and potentially wind, solar, and the other alternative energy forms?
Wow! You've set the bar pretty high with those requirements. I suppose you might look at Honeywell (NYSE:HON), or possibly General Electric (NYSE:GE) -- once it stops shedding its parts -- or maybe we could talk about Siemens (NYSE:SI), or even Emerson Electric (NYSE:EMR). But it just may be that Switzerland's ABB Ltd. (NYSE:ABB) fits your pistol best. It just so happens that ABB just released its second quarter results, and, if you'll permit me to mix in one more metaphor, the quarter was a genuine whopper.
ABB reported a 34% jump in its net income to $975 million. It also saw its orders increase by 31% to a record $11.3 billion. And it's also noteworthy that, for the first time in the company's long history, total orders from emerging markets exceeded those from "mature economies." In fact, oil- and gas-related demand for the company's products and services virtually doubled order volumes in the Middle East and Africa, so the energy connection also is already benefiting the company mightily. And when all was said and done, all of the company's individual segments raised their revenues by at least 23%.
Fine, but what does ABB do exactly? We could spend a day on the answer and its multiple business segments, but its largest division -- Power Products -- manufactures all manner of switchgear, circuit breakers, and transformers. Its Power Systems division provides a variety of systems for large-scale power generation. Order backlogs for the two power units were up a fat 38% and 31%, respectively.
So, in a very real sense, ABB is already at the forefront of the world's rapidly growing quest to use current sources of energy more efficiently and later will play a role in bringing alternative energy forms to the point where then can begin to displace hydrocarbons. But perhaps the most compelling thing about the company is that, as you can see, it's hardly a pie-in-the-sky venture. Its quarterly numbers speak volumes for themselves.
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