My latest post is up at RealMoney.

In it, I extend yesterday’s observations about the hidden strength in durable goods orders to specific industries that might benefit. Among those industries were primary metals, computers and electronic products, and motor vehicles and parts.

These industries may prove to be a good starting point for further research.

In some ways, having a one-letter ticker symbol is considered prestigious - a sign that the company was able to stake an early claim on the stock market real estate. Whether true or not, Federated Department Stores is after one of the few remaining available letters following its planned name change to Macy’s.

M Is Not For Microsoft - Forbes.com

“M” was once thought to be reserved by the New York Stock Exchange for Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ), which is listed on the Nasdaq Composite as “MSFT.”The letter was available, so that made it fair game for Federated, which has traded under the ticker symbol “FD” on the New York Stock Exchange since 1992.

Of the more than 3,100 companies whose stocks trade on the NYSE, the following one-letter symbols are available: G, I, J, L, N, P, U, V, W and Z.

Federated Chief Executive Terry Lundgren made it sound like it’s a positive change in corporate strategy rather than just a sexier, more attractive letter.

“Changing the parent company name to Macy’s Inc.,” Lundgren said in a news release, “while trading our shares under the ‘M’ ticker symbol will make it simple and clear for all investors to understand we are a brand-driven and consumer-oriented company.”

So just how prestigious is the honor? You be the guide as we scroll through the list of existing one-letter tickers. (We promise we are going only by memory - for the CNBC Trivia crowd, have some fun and try to fill in the blanks or catch us out if we are wrong!

A - Agilent

B - ?

C - Citigroup (formerly Chrysler until the Daimler thingy)

D - ?

E - ?

F - Ford

G - Not in use

H - ?

I - Not in use

J - used to be Jackpot, Inc. Were they bought?

K - Kellogg

L - Not in use

M - Soon to be Macy’s

N - Was Inco

O - ?

P - Not in use

Q - Qwest Communications

R - Ryder System

S - Sprint Nextel (used to be Sears)

T - AT&T

U - Not in use

V - Not in use

W - Not in use

X - US Steel
Y - ?
Z - Not in use

So… three telecom companies and a bunch of old line firms. You decide how prestigious it is, and comment below on our shortcomings.

The market being in a celebratory mood, little attention is being paid to such gloomy news as the durable goods report, which Briefing.com describes in rather bleak terms:

August durable goods new orders dropped a disappointing 0.5%.  There was nothing in the breakdown of the data to provide contrary cheer. Every key category was soft.

So, in an attempt to find the silver lining and push the market over the critical hump so we can enjoy the champagne we have had on ice since January, 2000, here are the durable goods categories that showed better growth in both shipments and new orders in August (all data sourced from US Department of Commerce, on a non-seasonally adjusted year/year basis.)

The clear winner in today’s report was Defense Capital Goods, which saw nearly a 70% rise in new orders and a 10% rise in shipments. And while the trend does nothing to help our general sense of well-being, with inventory and backlog flat and a customer with good credit quality the defense sector appears to be a good play in this environment.

The runner-up for our affections is Communications Equipment, not traditionally a defensive play but perhaps so today due to how low the sector sunk and the high credit quality of its remaining customers. Those who deride Verizon’s capital spending may not appreciate that the company is one of the last threads on which the economy hangs. At any rate, their spending appears to be lending a helping hand to the environment for comm equipment manufacturers.

In the “ehh, I guess we’ll take it” department is Transportation Equipment. New orders improved and turned positive, while shipments did just a bit better. Still, the inventory growth suggests that the industry is making too much stuff and will have to cut prices, production or both in the near future.

Finally, last but (unfortunately) not least comes Motor Vehicles and Parts.  Orders and shipments for beleaguered Detroit were both down year/year. However, they were down less than they were in July. With inventory building up further the industry may still be going to hell in a handbasket, but it will take longer to get there. That’s positive, isn’t it?

We now return to our previously scheduled celebration.

Even if said CEO is a descendant of the company founder and family members control 40% of the voting stock.

We are of course talking about Ford (F) and the departure of CEO Bill Ford Tuesday. The “Thing” in question is highlighted by the Cover Page article published the same day (though not related by cause and effect) by the St. Louis Federal Reserve National Economic Trends publication. (Aside: We like to read the cover page each month because it seems to indicate the issues that are concerning the Fed at the moment.)

This month’s topic was the effect of sustained high oil prices on consumer spending. According to the article:

Timothy Bresnahan and Valerie Ramey studied the effect of the oil shocks of the 1970s and early 1980s on the automobile industry. Specifically, they examined how changing demand from standard-sized vehicles to smaller, more fuel-efficient cars affected the economy. They found that capacity utilization—the ratio of total cars produced to potential cars produced without using overtime—fell from above 100 percent in 1973 to around 50 percent in 1975. Similarly, capacity utilization fell from 100 percent to around 40 percent in 1982.2 Both instances followed sustained high levels of gasoline prices, which caused such a shift in consumer choices. Today’s high gas prices may do the same. The National Automobile Dealers Association reported that year-to-date SUV sales were down 19 percent in July compared with the same time last year.

Of course, as Barry Ritholtz pointed out, the economists like to exclude oil prices from inflation. Meanwhile, plummeting prices for SUVs make “core” inflation look better than it is.

Of course, there is far more blame to pass around than high oil prices for Ford’s mess. But when a company is already on the ropes, the last thing it needs is for capacity utilization to be cut in half.

It’s the kind of thing that will get a CEO fired.

Disclosure: Author is long UNITED STS OIL FD LP UNITS (USO) at time of publication.

Forgive us for being cynical, but have higher gas prices and interest rates on loan payments perhaps contributed to insurance fraud? Three of the top 4 stolen cars were big trucks last year.

GM, Chrysler and Ford want to make more cars that people are keen to buy but they already have a few models that people like to steal.

For the fourth straight year, GM’s luxury Cadillac Escalade topped the list of late-model vehicles most coveted by thieves, according to an analysis of theft claims in 2005 by the insurance industry.

Ford’s F-250/350 large pickup truck was in the top five most stolen models along with the Dodge Ram 1500 quad cab pickup and the Sebring four-door sedan, both made by Chrysler.

Source: Cadillac Escalade still tops among car thieves - Jun. 7, 2006