Top 5 Transportation Stocks To Buy Right Now

Airline employment has dropped from last summer because of job cuts at American Airlines and regional carriers that use smaller planes.

The U.S. Department of Transportation said Tuesday that airlines employed the equivalent of 381,441 workers in June, down 2.4% from the same month last year. It's the 10th straight month of decline compared with a year earlier.

The DOT said that American cut about 5,400 jobs, or 8.4% of its workforce, as it slashed costs during bankruptcy. American had the equivalent of 59,163 full-time workers in June.

American parent AMR Corp., which is trying to merge with US Airways, has recently returned to profitability. This week it reported a record one-month adjusted profit of $352 million for July. The airline plans to hire 1,500 entry-level flight attendants to replace some of the roughly 2,200 experienced ones who took severance offers to leave last year.

While American cut jobs, its American Eagle regional subsidiary added about 1,300 jobs or 13.5%. But most regional carriers, which contract with bigger airlines to operate short-haul flights under brands such as United Express and Delta Connection, reduced jobs as high fuel costs made many 50-seat jets too expensive to fly.

Top Construction Companies For 2015: C.H. Robinson Worldwide Inc.(CHRW)

C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc., a third-party logistics company, provides multimodal freight transportation services and logistics solutions to companies in various industries worldwide. It offers freight transportation services through its contractual relationships with various transportation companies, including motor carriers, railroads, air freight carriers, and ocean carriers. The company has contractual relationships with approximately 49,000 transportation companies. Its transportation and logistics services include truckload, less-than-truckload, intermodal, ocean, and air freight transportation, as well as transportation management, customs brokerage, and warehousing services. In addition, it engages in buying, selling, and marketing fresh produce to grocery retailers, restaurants, produce wholesalers, and foodservice distributors under the Fresh 1 and OurWorld Organics names, as well as under Tropicana, Welch?s, Mott?s, and Glory Foods names. Further, the company provides spend management and payment processing services through a platform that facilitates funds transfer, vendor payments, fuel purchasing, and online expense management primarily for motor carriers and truck stop chains. It operates through a network of 232 branch offices in North America, Europe, Asia, South America, Australia, and the Middle East. C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc. was founded in 1905 and is headquartered in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Gary Jakacky]

  Only one company convincingly jumped thru all the hoops: C.H. Robinson Worldwide, Inc. (CHRW).

  If only one of the companies in IYT appear to be undervalued, it might give you pause about how brightly the ETF will shine in the very near future.

Top 5 Transportation Stocks To Buy Right Now: Enbridge Energy Partners LP (EEP)

Enbridge Energy Partners, L.P. (the Partnership) owns and operates crude oil and liquid petroleum transportation and storage assets, and natural gas gathering, treating, processing, transportation and marketing assets in the United States. The Company was formed by its Enbridge Energy Company, Inc. (General Partner), to own and operate the Lakehead system, which is the United States portion of a crude oil and liquid petroleum pipeline system extending from western Canada through the upper and lower Great Lakes region of the United States to eastern Canada. A subsidiary of Enbridge Inc. (Enbridge), owns the Canadian portion of the Mainline system. Enbridge, which is based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada is a provider of energy transportation, distribution and related services in North America and internationally. Enbridge is the ultimate parent of its General Partner. As of December 31, 2011, its portfolio of assets included the approximately 6,500 miles of crude oil gathering and transportation lines and 32 million barrels of crude oil storage and terminaling capacity; natural gas gathering and transportation lines totaling approximately 11,500 miles; nine natural gas treating and 25 natural gas processing facilities with an aggregate capacity of approximately 3,255 million cubic feet per day, including plants; trucks, trailers and railcars for transporting natural gas liquids (NGLs), crude oil and carbon dioxide, and marketing assets, which provide natural gas supply, transmission, storage and sales services. The Company conducts its business through three business segments: Liquids, Natural Gas and Marketing.

Liquids Segment

The Company�� Lakehead system consists of crude oil and liquid petroleum common carrier pipelines and terminal assets in the Great Lakes and Midwest regions of the United States. The Mainline system serves refining centers in the Great Lakes and Midwest regions of the United States and the Province of Ontario, Canada. Its Lakehead system spans a distance ! of approximately 1,900 miles, and consists of approximately 5,100 miles of pipe with diameters ranging from 12 inches to 48 inches, and is transporter of crude oil and liquid petroleum from Western Canada to the United States. In addition, the system has 61 pump station locations with a total of approximately 900,000 installed horsepower and 72 crude oil storage tanks with capacity of approximately 13.9 million barrels. The Mainline system operates in a segregation, or batch mode, allowing the transport in excess of 50 crude oil commodities, including light, medium and heavy crude oil, condensate and NGLs.

The Company�� Mid-Continent system is located within PADD II and is consisted of its Ozark pipeline and storage terminals at Cushing and El Dorado, Kansas. Its Mid-Continent system includes over 430 miles of crude oil pipelines and 17.3 million barrels of crude oil storage capacity. Its Ozark pipeline transports crude oil from Cushing to Wood River where it delivers to ConocoPhillips��Wood River refinery and interconnects with the Woodpat Pipeline and the Wood River Pipeline. The storage terminals consist of 91 individual storage tanks ranging in size from 58,000 to 575,000 barrels. Of the 17.3 million barrels of storage capacity on its Mid-Continent system, the Cushing terminal accounts for 16.1 million barrels. A portion of the storage facilities are used for operational purposes, while it contracts the remainder of the facilities with various crude oil market participants for their term storage requirements. Contract fees include fixed monthly capacity fees, as well as utilization fees, which it charges for injecting crude oil into and withdrawing crude oil from the storage facilities.

The Company�� Mid-Continent system operates under month-to-month transportation arrangements and both long-term and short-term storage arrangements with its shippers. Its North Dakota system is a crude oil gathering and interstate transportation system servicing the Williston basin in! North Da! kota and Montana, which includes the Bakken and Three Forks formations. The crude oil gathering pipelines of its North Dakota system collect crude oil from points near producing wells in approximately 22 oil fields in North Dakota and Montana. Its North Dakota system is made at Clearbrook to its Lakehead system and to a third-party pipeline system. As of December 31, 2011, its North Dakota system included approximately 240 miles of crude oil gathering lines connected to a transportation line, which is approximately 730 miles long, with a capacity of approximately 210,000 barrels per day. Its North Dakota system also has 21 pump stations, one delivery station and 11 storage facilities with an aggregate working storage capacity of approximately 870,000 barrels. During the year ended December 31, 2011, it added 25,000 barrels per day of capacity from Berthold, North Dakota to the international border near Lignite, North Dakota.

Natural Gas Segment

The Company owns and operates natural gas gathering, treating, processing and transportation systems, as well as trucking, rail and liquids marketing operations. It purchases and gathers natural gas from the wellhead and delivers it to plants for treating and/or processing and to intrastate or interstate pipelines for transmission to wholesale customers, such as power plants, industrial customers and local distribution companies. As of December 31, 2011, it had nine active treating plants and 25 active processing plants, including two hydrocarbon dewpoint control facilities (HCDP) plants. Its treating facilities have a combined capacity, which approximates 1,240 million cubic feet per day while the combined capacity of its processing facilities approximates 2,015 million cubic feet per day, including 350 million cubic feet per day provided by the HCDP plants.

The Company�� natural gas business consists of East Texas system, Anadarko system and North Texas system. East Texas system includes approximately 3,900 miles of nat! ural gas ! gathering and transportation pipelines, eight natural gas treating plants and five natural gas processing plants, including two HCDP plants. Anadarko system consists of approximately 2,900 miles of natural gas gathering and transportation pipelines in southwest Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle, one natural gas treating plant and 11 natural gas processing plants. North Texas system includes approximately 4,700 miles of natural gas gathering pipelines and nine natural gas processing plants located in the Fort Worth basin. Its East Texas system is located in the East Texas basin. Natural gas on its North Texas system is produced in the Barnett shale area within the Fort Worth basin conglomerate. Its Anadarko system is located within the Anadarko basin.

As of December 31, 2011, the Company�� Elk City system includes one carbon dioxide treating plant and three cryogenic processing plants with a total capacity of 370 million cubic feet per day, and a NGL production capability of 20,000 barrels per day. It also includes its trucking and NGL marketing operations in its Natural Gas segment. These operations include the transportation of NGLs, crude oil and other products by truck and railcar from wellheads and treating, processing and fractionation facilities to wholesale customers, such as distributors, refiners and chemical facilities. In addition, its trucking and NGL marketing operations resells these products. Its services are provided using trucks, trailers and rail cars, pipeline capacity, fractionation agreements, product treating and handling equipment. Its trucking operations transport NGLs, condensate and crude oil from its processing facilities and from third party producers to its United States Gulf Coast customers. As of December 31, 2011, its fleet consisted of approximately 220 trucks and 375 trailers. Its trucking and NGL marketing operations are wholesale customers, such as refineries and propane distributors. Its trucking and NGL marketing operations also market products to whol! esale cus! tomers, such as petrochemical plants.

Marketing Segment

The Company�� Marketing segment transacts with various counterparties to provide natural gas supply, transportation, balancing, storage and sales services. Its Marketing business uses third-party storage capacity to balance supply and demand factors within its portfolio. Its Marketing business pays third-party storage facilities and pipelines for the right to store gas for various periods of time. These contracts may be denoted as firm storage, interruptible storage or parking and lending services. Its Marketing business leases third-party pipeline capacity downstream from its Natural Gas assets under firm transportation contracts. This capacity is leased for various lengths of time and at rates.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Isac Simon]

  The Bakken Shale play is already booming. Existing pipeline systems in that region are at full capacity. Enbridge Energy Partners (NYSE: EEP  ) owns the 1,900-mile Lakehead system which transports 2.5 million barrels per day of�crude from North Dakota to Illinois. Additionally, the company's 970-mile North Dakota pipeline system from Montana to Clearbrook has a capacity of 210,000 bpd.

Top 5 Transportation Stocks To Buy Right Now: Ryanair (RYAAY)

Ryanair Holdings plc (Ryanair Holdings), incorporated in 1996, is a holding company for Ryanair Limited (Ryanair). Ryanair operates a low-cost, scheduled-passenger airline serving short-haul, point-to-point routes between Ireland, the United Kingdom, Continental Europe, and Morocco. As of June 30, 2012, the Company offered approximately over 1,500 scheduled short-haul flights per day serving approximately 160 airports largely throughout Europe with an operating fleet of 294 aircraft flying approximately 1,500 routes. Ryanair sells seats on a one-way basis. The Company also holds a 29.8% interest in Aer Lingus Group plc. As of June 30, 2012, Ryanair�� operating fleet was composed of 294 Boeing 737-800 aircraft, each having 189 seats. Ryanair�� fleet totaled 294 Boeing 737-800s at March 31, 2012. As of June 30, 2012, Ryanair owned and operated four Boeing 737-800 full flight simulators for pilot training. Ryanair provides ancillary services and engages in other activities connected with its core air passenger service, including non-flight scheduled services, Internet-related services, and the in-flight sale of beverages, food, and merchandise. As part of its non-flight scheduled and Internet-related services Ryanair incentivizes ground service providers at airports it serves to levy correct excess baggage charges for any baggage, which exceeds Ryanair�� published baggage allowances. Excess baggage charges are recorded as non-flight scheduled revenue. Ryanair distributes accommodation services and travel insurance through its Website. For hotel services, Ryanair has a contract with Hotelscombined PTY Ltd. (Hotelscombined), which operates a price comparison Website, pursuant to which Hotelscombined handles all aspects of such services marketed through Ryanair�� Website and pays a fee to Ryanair. Ryanair also has contracts with other accommodation providers that enable Ryanair to offer hostel, bed-and-breakfast, guesthouse, villa and apartment accommodation to its customers. In addition Ryanair has a contract with Hertz, pursuant to which Hertz handles all car rental services marketed through Ryanair�� Website or telephone reservation system. Ryanair also sells bus and rail tickets onboard its aircraft and through its Website. Ryanair also sells attractions and activities on its Website. Ryanair sells gift vouchers on its Website, which are also redeemable online. The Company has an contract with Webloyalty International Ltd, which offers Ryanair�� customers who have a United Kingdom, German or French billing address a retail discount and cash-back program. Ryanair has agreements, pursuant to which the Company promotes Ryanair-branded credit cards issued by MBNA, GE Money, Access Prepaid and Banco Santander on its Internet site. The MBNA agreement relates to Irish residents only, the GE Money agreement relates to Swedish and Polish residents only and the Banco Santander agreement relates to United Kingdom residents only. During the fiscal year ended March 31, 2012, Ryanair rolled out handheld Electronic Point of Sale (EPOS) devices across its route network. These EPOS devices replaced manual and paper based systems on board the aircraft. The EPOS device enables cabin crew to sell and record their on-board sales transactions. The EPOS device also issues bus and rail tickets and tickets for tourist attractions. The Company also offers reserved seating in twenty-one extra legroom seats on each aircraft for a fee on certain routes. Ryanair provides its own aircraft and passenger handling and ticketing services at Dublin Airport. Third parties provide these services to Ryanair at other airports it serves. Servisair plc provides Ryanair�� ticketing, passenger and aircraft handling, and ground handling services at airports in Ireland and the United Kingdom(excluding London (Stansted) Airport where these services are provided by Swissport Ltd.), while similar services in continental Europe are provided by the local airport authorities, either directly or through sub-contractors. Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Holly LaFon]

  In the world of publicly-owned businesses, we try to invest with the same sort of individuals. In our opinion, Michael O'Leary, Ryanair's Chairman and CEO, is one such example of a talented, driven executive. Michael was born on a farm in Ireland, the second oldest of six siblings. Although his beginnings were not remarkable, Michael figured out how to get the best education he could by attending the best schools he could. After attending a Jesuit boarding school as a young boy, he graduated from Trinity College with an accounting degree; began his career working for KPMG, a large public accounting firm; and, soon afterwards, became a financial advisor to Tony Ryan, Ryanair's founder. In 1986, Michael was hired to work for Ryan and initially advised him to close the airline immediately since it was losing so much money! In 1989, when Ryanair (RYAAY) was on the brink of insolvency, Ryan offered Michael the job of Deputy CEO of the airline and in 1994 as its CEO. Michael accepted, on the condition that if he couldn't make it profitable, he would be allowed to shut it down! He also chose to work for a percentage of profits rather than for a salary from the money losing business.

• [By Monica Gerson]

  Ryanair Holdings plc (NASDAQ: RYAAY) dipped 4.09% to $49.43 in pre-market trading after falling 1.06% on Thursday.

  Posted-In: PreMarket LosersNews Movers & Shakers Pre-Market Outlook Markets

Top 5 Transportation Stocks To Buy Right Now: Kinder Morgan Management LLC (KMR)

Kinder Morgan Management, LLC is a limited partner in Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P (KMP), and manages and controls its business and affairs pursuant to a delegation of control agreement. Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc., of which Kinder Morgan, Inc. indirectly owns all of the outstanding common equity, is the general partner of Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. (KMP). Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc., pursuant to a delegation of control agreement among the Company, Kinder Morgan G.P., Inc. and KMP, has delegated to the Company, to the fullest extent permitted under Delaware law and KMP�� limited partnership agreement, all of its rights and powers to manage and control the business and affairs of KMP, subject to the general partner�� right to approve specified actions.

KPM is a pipeline limited partnerships in the United States. KMP owns an investment in or operates approximately 28,000 miles of pipelines and 180 terminals. Its pipelines transport products, such as natural gas, crude oil, gasoline, and CO2, and its terminals store petroleum products and chemicals and handle materials like coal. Almost all of Kinder Morgan assets are owned by KMP, KMP operates in five business segments : Natural Gas Pipelines, Products Pipelines, CO2, Terminals and Kinder Morgan Canada.

Kinder Morgan is a transporter and marketer of carbon dioxide in North America. It delivers approximately 1.3 billion cubic feet per day of CO2 through about 1,300 miles of pipelines. It is an oil producer in Texas, producing over 55,000 barrels of oil per day at the SACROC Unit and the Yates Field in the Permian Basin. In addition to CO2 pipelines and oil producing fields, this business segment owns interests in and operates CO2 source fields, natural gas and gasoline processing plants, and a crude oil pipeline. Kinder Morgan owns and operates approximately 24,000 miles of gas pipelines in the Rocky Mountains, the Midwest and Texas. Through its Products Pipelines business unit, it transports over two million barre! ls per day of gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, natural gas liquids and other fuels through more than 8,000 miles of pipelines. The Company also has approximately 50 liquids terminals in this business segment that store fuels and offer blending services for ethanol and other products.

Kinder Morgan have more than 180 terminals that store petroleum products and chemicals, and handle bulk materials like coal, petroleum coke and steel products. Kinder Morgan operates a number of pipeline systems and terminal facilities in Canada including the Trans Mountain pipeline, the Express and Platte pipelines, the Cochin pipeline, the Puget Sound and the Trans Mountain Jet Fuel pipelines, the Westridge marine terminal, the Vancouver Wharves terminal in British Columbia and the North Forty terminal in Edmonton, Alberta.

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By David Dittman]

  Answer: If you don’t want to deal with K-1s at tax time, Kinder Morgan Inc (NYSE: KMI) is a suitable alternative, as is Kinder Morgan Management (NYSE: KMR), which pays its distribution in the form of Kinder Morgan Energy Partners units.

• [By Ben Levisohn]

  Kinder’s little boost of confidence appears to have worked today. Kinder Morgan’s shares have gained 3% to $36.28 today, while Kinder Morgan Energy Partners (KMP) has ticked up 0.2% to $80.38. Kinder Morgan Management (KMR) has dropped 1.7% to $75.41.

• [By MONEYMORNING.COM]

  In a series of transactions, KMI will acquire all of Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP (NYSE: KMP), Kinder Morgan Management LLC (NYSE: KMR), and El Paso Pipeline Partners LP (NYSE: EPB) for about $40 billion in stock and $4 billion in cash. KMI will also assume $27 billion in debt, bringing the total transaction value upwards of $70 billion.

• [By Matt DiLallo]

  Kinder Morgan offers investors four ways to invest. In addition to the parent company, Kinder Morgan, investors can also choose to invest in MLPs Kinder Morgan Partners and El Paso Pipeline Partners or Kinder Morgan Management (NYSE: KMR  ) . Both of the partnerships directly own the pipeline and other midstream assets and offer higher yields. Meanwhile, the management company offers a tax-friendly way to invest in Kinder Morgan Partners with one key difference: Investors are paid in shares instead of cash. No matter which option you choose, Kinder Morgan is a top company whose stock, or units, are a great holding for any portfolio.