Ignore the FAA Setback, Drone Stocks Are Still Strong Buys

A federal advisory panel necessary for clarifying the FAA's drone rules couldn't reach a consensus, and Fortune is calling it a "major setback" for drones.

The headline is overblown. We believe drone stocks are still strong buys despite, and this is merely a bump in the road on the way to skyrocketing sales.

In fact, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) still projects all drone sales will climb from 2.5 million in 2016 to 7 million in 2020.

That's a 180% increase in sales in just four years.

The next three years will be great for drone makers as demand skyrockets, but they will also create your next profit opportunity, no matter what the Fortune report says...

Why the Latest FAA Issue Is Hardly a Setback for Drone Stocks

In 2016, the FAA drafted rules to track drones, and the FAA released these rules in August 2016.

The guidelines say drone operators must pass a drone certification exam, fly drones under 100 miles per hour and under 400 feet, and never fly drones at night.

The FBI objected to the rules, stating they wanted more focus on how to pinpoint the designated travel plans and exact locations of drones electronically, according to The Wall Street Journal.

To address the FBI's concerns, a federal advisory panel - made up of 70 aviation and legal experts - was appointed to provide recommendations to the FAA on tracking unmanned aircraft across the nation.

The advisory board's recommendations were crucial to helping the FAA clarify its rules governing drone flight, including commercial drone flights. FAA Chief Administrator Michael Huerta said, "I can't stress how important this work is," during a Sept. 6 drone conference in Las Vegas.

But the panel was unable to reach a consensus on the categories of drones that need remote monitoring when presenting its findings to the FAA in early October.

And some are worried this will put the U.S. drone market behind other countries and delay the FAA from updating its drone delivery policies...

For example, Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) applied for a permit to fly drones in 2014, but it didn't receive permission from the FAA until a year later, according to Recode. By the time it received permission, Amazon said the drone that was approved was already outdated and the company had a new design.

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Get In On the Drone Craze Now, Before Sales Quadruple

CEO Jeff Bezos then decided to take his drone tests to the United Kingdom, where Amazon completed its first successful drone package delivery in December 2016.

The new setback could keep clouding the waters about what businesses can or can't do with drones.

But fortunately for the drone industry, it just gained a powerful ally...

In an October speech to a drone conference in San Jose, Calif., Deputy Chief of the White House Office of Science and Technology Michael Kratsios told the attendees the United States wanted to encourage drone innovation.

"We want to make it possible for you to design, test, and deploy your inventions here in the United States," Kratsios said, according to WSJ.

An announcement about the new plans is expected in days or weeks, according to WSJ.

So this disagreement is not a "major setback," as there are already rules in place for drone use and support from the current administration to help the U.S. drone industry grow.

This is just a disagreement until the panel reaches a consensus and addresses the concerns of government agencies.

Also, keep in mind the FAA projected U.S. drone sales would increase 180% in four years even with its current, less clear regulations in place. If the FAA finds a way to safely regulate drones for deliveries and other uses, that sales increase could be too conservative.

It's only a matter of "when," not "if," drone restrictions in the United States are lifted.

Investing in Drones Will Be Like Investing in Smartphones in 2009: If you've thought of drones in military terms or just as toys, this is a wake-up call. Find out more.

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.

Here's everything you need to know about how you could pocket $115,900 from the next frontier in flight.

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