Drone stocks are already going to benefit from 86% industry growth over the next three years. But this major retailer's radical new plan to launch drones from "floating warehouses" in the sky could mean the potential for drones is even bigger...
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) divulged plans on Aug. 17, 2017, to use drones to deliver products right to customers' front doors from warehouses attached to blimps.
While Wal-Mart's plan might sound like science fiction, it could actually be a boon to the drone industry.
Here's how it could work and why drone sales are expected to climb from $6 billion in 2017 to $11.2 billion by 2020, even before Wal-Mart's far-fetched plan is developed further...
Wal-Mart Will Help Increase Drone Sales and Be a Boon for Drone Stocks
On Aug. 17, 2017, Wal-Mart filed for a patent to create a blimp-like aircraft filled with merchandise and specifically designed to launch drones directly to customers' homes. We aren't taking this idea seriously right now, but it's still a good sign for the drone industry.
And it shows even an aging retailer like Wal-Mart is willing to take a chance on finding faster and more efficient ways to deliver customer orders.
Wal-Mart may never have a "floating warehouse," but they could still buy drones to deliver products between stores.
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According to DigitalTrends.com, the floating warehouses would stop by a ground-based location to be loaded up with products and drones. Then, the blimp would find an "optimum" location for the drones to deliver the products.
When the vehicle is empty, it would return to be filled with more products and to recharge the drones' batteries.
Of course, it could be years before this ever happens. The patent is still pending, and there isn't a working prototype that we know about. And even if Wal-Mart has a prototype, it still needs permission from U.S. regulators to test drones for home delivery.
But once the patent and drone deliveries are approved, this will be a boon for drone stocks...
It's still too early to project how many drones Wal-Mart would buy, but Wal-Mart does have over 150 distribution centers across the globe.
If Wal-Mart wanted 100 drones for each distribution center, that would be a purchase order of 15,000 drones.
Widespread use like this could help drone stock prices skyrocket, too.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Seeks Permission for Drone Deliveries
According to research and advisory firm Gartner, the market revenue for the personal and commercial global drone market is expected to climb from $6 billion in 2017 to $11.2 billion by 2020.
That's an 86% increase in revenue in just three years.
And it's not just companies that can cash in on the drone craze. Sources are saying there could be $127 billion in new wealth being created in the drone market as we speak.
And this is beyond anything Money Morning Executive Editor Bill Patalon could have imagined...
Financial Guru Bill Patalon Just Uncovered Your Next Profit Opportunity
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Before Patalon moved into the investment-research business in December 2005, he spent 22 years as a journalist, most of it covering financial news as a reporter, columnist, and editor for outlets such as Gannett Co. Inc. and The Baltimore Sun.
He has covered finance and investing, economics, manufacturing, the defense sector, biotechnology, and telecommunications. The companies he's covered include Eastman Kodak Co., Xerox Corp., Harley-Davidson Inc., Caterpillar Inc., Westinghouse Electric Co. LLC, Verizon Communications Inc., MedImmune LLC, and Black & Decker Inc.
His most memorable interviews include former U.S. President Richard M. Nixon, General Electric CEO John F. "Jack" Welch, Forbes magazine publisher and former presidential candidate Steve Forbes, and business-turnaround specialist and helicopter industry pioneer Stanley Hiller, Jr.
It was Patalon's work covering Eastman Kodak Co. during the latter half of the 1990s that solidified his reputation as one of the nation's top analytical business journalists. With his award-winning reports on Kodak's competitive travails, he consistently scooped his competitors in the national business media. His chronicles of Kodak's turnaround efforts took him to China, Japan, Silicon Valley, New York, Washington, D.C., and even Hollywood.
Along the way, he earned the esteem of heavyweights like Anthony Gallea, senior portfolio management director at Morgan Stanley, who collaborated on Patalon's groundbreaking 1999 book "Contrarian Investing."
Patalon's ideas so impressed Jim Rogers that the hedge fund genius eagerly wrote a glowing, six-page introduction to the book.
A winner of approximately two-dozen journalism awards - including top honors from the Associated Press and the prestigious Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW) - Patalon has had his work featured in Kiplinger's personal finance magazine, USA Today, and The South China Morning Post, among other publications.
Before taking over Money Morning, he served as the editor of The Rebound Report, an investment newsletter focused on turnaround stocks.
Patalon has a Bachelor's in Print Journalism from Penn State University and an MBA in finance from the Rochester Institute of Technology.
Yes, he's uncovered a lot of investment stories. And he's even been nominated for two Pulitzer Prizes.
But he's never seen a story as potentially lucrative as this one...
The Next $127 Billion Profit Opportunity
In the barren, hostile plains of the New Mexico desert, not far from the Mexican border, they're building a city like no other.
A city with high rises, avenues, parks, a big-box store, churches, and gas stations for a population of 35,000, all at a ground-up cost exceeding $1 billion...
It's made to look like so many other cities in America, except for one thing: people. There are none. It's a ghost town, and it always will be.
Here's what Patalon learned about this ghost town and what he believes is really going on.
Its location in New Mexico is the first key: The state scoops up tons of government research dollars straight from Washington.
And indeed, located in hardened shelters far beneath this empty city will be teams of top-secret scientists and federal contractors hard at work...
Driven by what they call "mother's milk" - the hopes of seeing billions of dollars in government funding coming their way. Not to mention the many billions more in new wealth that they hope to create.
Patalon has identified the main group of scientists and researchers behind this project.
They are quite clearly inventing a big future, with new technologies that stretch the imagination - new technologies that are about to be everywhere.
They call their ghost town "Project CITE."
It's the brainchild of the government contractor Marble Arch.
And when you learn how tight Marble Arch is with the Pentagon and how many massive government contracts Marble Arch has scooped up over the years, you know something big is happening here.
"Big," as in "$127-billion-in-new-wealth-for-early-investors Big," Patalon's findings suggest.
Marble Arch is run by Bob Brumley, who was U.S. President Ronald Reagan's point man for privatizing commercial space transportation. He's definitely a big thinker - like an Elon Musk with a direct line to government funding!
And this new venture of his is every bit as ambitious as space travel, with even bigger impact, because it's happening right before our eyes.
Now, as we mentioned, the specific details of this venture are not public. But after Patalon's investigation, he's incredibly confident it will involve the next big thing in tech, security, and investing.
He's talking about unmanned flying machines.
Yes, drones.
But not the drones you're probably thinking of. Not the kind the military uses to hunt down and kill enemy terrorists. Not any kind you've ever heard of before.
These are what Patalon calls "AI Drones" - a brand-new breed of amazingly intelligent, super-capable drones unlike anything Patalon's ever witnessed; drones that can use artificial intelligence to benefit more people, businesses, and countries than you could have ever imagined possible.
But there's another reason why these new drones will soon be everywhere.
I'm talking about a big event that just happened...
An event that's blowing the lid off the drone market not two years from now... not a year from now... not even six months from now...
IMMEDIATELY.
It's happening as we speak.
And Patalon has uncovered one tiny company sitting at the center of it all. You may never have a better shot at getting in on the ground floor of such a massive new market.
By getting in early, you could profit from the potential 4,636% gain that Patalon's projecting. A gain like this would be the equivalent of turning...
Every $50 you invest into $2,318...
Every $2,500 into $115,900...
And every $10,000 into $463,600.
As you know, these kind of quadruple-digit returns are exceptional and don't happen every day. But think about it - even a fraction of these gains could make you a fortune.
Plus, this kind of spike makes perfect sense when you think about it. This is investing in the next frontier in aviation - the next great leap forward.
Patalon sees dollar signs, pure and simple, which is why he put a briefing together for you, including this investment recommendation, as well...
Now, because this is a small stock, there will be volatility. So he'll also recommend a tight buying strategy. The last thing any investor wants to do is blindly chase a small stock upward with no plan in mind. And, as always, never investing more than one can afford to lose is good advice.