From initial appearances, new Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) CEO Alan Mulally is making great progress in turning around the fledgling automaker from a series of huge losses (quarters and years) into turning out vehicles customers actually want and are buying in decent numbers. The huge SUV and gas-guzzling full-size car that remained specialties of Ford for so long are being replaced by the Fusion mid-size/compact and smaller crossover SUVs like the Edge, according to recent monthly sales results. Mulally said recently that his "Way Forward" plan on revitalizing Ford is on track, if not slightly ahead of schedule. For Ford investors looking for good Ford news in the face of recent disastrous quarters and fiscal years, this is music to the ears.

Although Ford saw a 12% sales decline from January to May of this year, the automaker has made many right moves to correct the ship and get its product portfolio more competitive to Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE: TM), Honda Motor Co., LTD. (NYSE: HMC) and even Nissan Motor Co., LTD. (NASDAQ: NSANY). Mulally's "Way Forward" plan to get Ford back on track relies partly on product planning, getting unions to cooperate with business needs (always a nightmare), and competing with the newest #1 seller on the planet, Toyota. Neat job if you can get it, but as he said recently, he's making progress.

I'm not sure that changing the name of the Ford Five Hundred luxury sedan back to the venerable "Taurus" name will do anything but give the automaker good press, but who knows. At one point, the Taurus was the most popular sedan nameplate in the country, even selling more than the Toyota Camry (the Taurus did this for years). Mulally says that Ford is on plan with regards to the company's turnaround, and he's probably right about that. Sometime in 2009 Ford should be profitable again, according to Mulally. But, until then, there's quite a bit of hard work left to be done.

Detroit's big three automakers are meeting with federal officials this week to try and address the mandate of 30mpg trucks and 35mpg passenger cars by 2020 (and beyond). Most likely, Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F), General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM) and Chrysler (in the process of being bought by Cerberus Capital Mgmt.) will state and build cases that it will be very unlikely that such fuel-efficient cars and trucks can be made in such a short time. In fact, all automakers that sell cars and trucks in the U.S. need to come to a common front or this new regulation will be completely doomed (according to industry watchers). Moving outside the fuel economy arena, though, are there even bigger problems with U.S. automakers these days?

How about a complete surplus of dealers? The actual number of Ford, GM and Chrysler dealers, based on autos sold, is huge: GM has nearly 7,000 dealers, Ford has 4,200 and Chrysler has 3,700. Based on sales of domestic cars and trucks in the last few years and the increasing presence of Toyota Motor Co. (which is outselling almost every other manufacturer in the U.S.), these numbers -- almost 15,000 dealers -- seem a bit high. Sure, the big three are in the process of reducing the ranks of dealers to fit current (and projected) business needs as the personal transportation market continually changes, but it can't happen fast enough.

Compare this to Toyota, whose dealer count in the U.S. tops out at about 1,400 dealers, while Toyota vehicles are just as (if not more) popular than most domestic nameplates from the big three. What has Toyota done to keep its dealer count low while selling more cars? Responding to the market's needs a lot faster? You bet. Marketing itself as the most reliable and dependable automaker? Sure. Can the big three recapture business from Japanese automakers by thinning the ranks of dealers? That's a start, but it's not any more than that.

Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) CEO Alan Mulally has a grand master plan to return Ford back to profitability by 2009, and he's making tons of cost-cutting and marketing moves to get there. Even with former Boeing exec Mulally at the helm, turning around Ford is no easy task seeing as that the company just had one of the worst years in its entire history. Too many workers, too many factories, not enough sales and an incorrect product mix. Add all that together along with the inability to react fast enough to market changes and Ford set itself up for failure.

Part of Mulally's plan to get Ford back on track is the "rightsizing" of the employee base. The CEO would like to see the number of employees more closely aligned with the needs of the company. He wants to ensure the right employee base can get the right amount of vehicles -- that customers want -- out the door and onto dealer lots just as demand materializes. So far, about 27,000 hourly workers have left Ford in the last year, with most of them having accepted buyout and early retirement packages. This was planned, of course, and the retirement and buyout strategy has worked well for Ford. Right now, there are about 10,000 workers left at Ford who signed up for the early retirement packages but who have yet to leave the company (a total of 37,00 employees signed up for it).

Mulally's "Way Forward" plan is set to take Ford into the future using long-term vision and ultimate flexibility, and so far the CEO is getting there as well he should be (seeing as the board granted him more than $17 million just to recruit him for the job before he had done anything). So far, Ford investors are probably liking what Mulally has done to get the Ford ship turned around, although there is much work to be done. If current results are any indication, it's already doing a good job with its products.

Will American consumers ever see $2.00/gallon gas prices again? Maybe, maybe not. Regardless, current high gasoline prices are pressuring automakers to get more efficient on engine models or make engines that burn less gas -- or a combination of both. Toyota Motor Corporation's (ADR) (NYSE: TM) hybrid models have been marketed perfectly to address this need, and more hybrid or alternative-energy cars and trucks are being shipped than ever before.

What are U.S. automakers who just love larger V6 and V8 engines to do? Start down the path to more efficient and smaller engines, of course. Susan Cischke, Ford Motor Company's (NYSE: F) new senior vice president for sustainability, environment and safety engineering, has a job that required her to look a few decades into the future.

What does she see? The internal combustion engine will still be around, although efficiency will have greatly increased along with other metrics that balance performance with engine output. How will Cischke find out what customers want to drive while at the same time making sure Ford is a good steward of the environment? That's her biggest challenge according to statements from the 53 year-old.

Although Ford's trucks are worldwide best sellers, the engines they have are gas guzzlers (as are most full-size truck engines). The American market has already seen that larger SUVs are no longer the preferred mode of transportation due to gas (in)efficiency, but will Ford get more efficient with that segment along with competitor GM soon with a smaller engine? Doubtful -- current technology can't drive a hulking SUV with a 2.0L, 4-cylinder engine. But, that kind of efficiency is what many of us want to drive these days just to save on energy costs, right?

Auto giant Ford Motor Company(NYSE: F) has had a lot to think about lately. The company is in the middle of a massive $11 Billion restructuring plan as it tries to climb back to profitability. The last thing it wants to have to deal with is trouble in its foreign assembly plants, but that is exactly what happened this month in Russia.

Two weeks ago, workers in the company's Russian assembly plant in Vsevolozhsk, near St. Petersburg, decided to flex their muscles by walking off the job for a 24-hour period. The workers threatened to go on a full blown strike if the company was not willing to come to a more favorable agreement with the labor union.

Today Ford has announced that they have been able to reached a compromise with the labor union that will enable operations to stay in full swing. The plant, which is Fords' only plant in the country, produced around 60,000 vehicles last year, and they are hoping to see that production output lift to about 75,000 this year. Ford agreed to give employees a wage increase of between 14 and 20%. The monthly workers at the plant are averaging between $500 and $700 a month for their work.

Russia has seen it's overall economic situation improve over the last year resulting from rising oil prices. More and more citizens can afford new cars. Because of this there has been a lot of interest from car manufacturers in setting up plants in the country. While the rapidly improving situation in Russia's auto industry isn't going to pull Ford out of it's troubles, it is still a good sign for the company to be back on good terms with its workers there.

It's not often that a company is able to create a product that winds up being an American icon, but Ford Motor (NYSE: F) did just that back in 1985 when they started pumping out the Taurus. The love affair with the Taurus came to a sad end back on October 27 when the final Taurus rolled off the assembly line at the company's Atlanta assembly plant.

Well, it appears that the company has had a change of heart. According to one company official, the Taurus name will be coming back to life! While it has not been officially announced by the company, it looks like Ford is going to start using the Taurus name on their Five Hundred model in hopes of ramping up consumer support.

I think that this is a great idea for the struggling auto maker. While sales of the Taurus had been dwindling over the last few years it is still a household name, and one that the car manufacturer should try to take advantage of if possible.

When Taurus was first introduced in 1985 the car was an immediate hit with buyers and helped lift the fortunes of the car maker, which had been losing billions in the early 80's. Perhaps the company is hoping some of that Taurus magic will return and help lift fortunes once again. Ford which lost $12.7 billion last year could definitely use a little of magic to help turn things around.

Look for an official announcement to come from Ford later this week at the Chicago Auto Show.

Michael Fowlkes has worked as a stock trader for seven years and spent the last two years working as an analyst for the online investment advisory service Investor's Observer.

The large car companies can stop putting out monthly figures and just make photo copies of the reports from the previous month. The U.S. car sales fall and Toyota picks up more share.

December auto sales show that Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) had a 12.3% rise in units to 228,322. Honda's sales were essentially flat at 131,778.

By contrast, Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) sales fell 12.8% to 233,621. Truck sales fell 14% at Ford to 163,003. The flagship F-series pick-up sales were off over 21% to 70,580.

General Motors Corporation (NYSE:GM) may have had the most disappointing month of all. Vehicles sales fell 13% to 334,501. Truck sales fell 21%.

DaimlerChrysler AG (NYSE:DCX) sales fell by a much smaller margin, down 1% to 218,530. Mercedes sales were off but an improvement at Chrysler helped the German car company come close to break-even compared to December of last year.

At the Big Three, the beatings will continue until morale improves. Unfortunately, the U.S. car industry faces further cuts in employment and costs, so is this likely to happen soon?

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

This post is written as part of AOL Money & Finance's Best & Worst 2006. If this post convinces you that Ford can make a comeback, cast your vote.

Recently I wrote a blog post about some of the nice things Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) is doing. It was just an overview and the article was cursory at best. A member of our excellent editing staff suggested that I might have readers who want a bit more explanation of just what has happened with Ford's stock market value over the last year. I think that for an even better perspective, I'll need to take you back ... way, way back....

Ford Motor Company's stock value entered this decade at $29.30 (the actual per share value was $53.51 but there's a split adjustment factored in). By the end of 2000 Ford stock had slipped to $23.44. One year later the shares had deflated to $15.95 and by the end of 2002 investors were viewing in amazement a stock value of just $9.58. In 2003 Ford took an upswing and shares ended that year at $16.18. But 2004 ended at $14.80, 2005 nearly halved that value to $7.90, and 2006 is shaping up to finish with Ford Motor Company shares close to today's ending price of $8.13. Two factors that must be considered when viewing this historical trend are: In 2000 Ford's daily share trading volume was in the range of 3,300,000, whereas yesterday's trading volume for Ford was over ten times that much at 30,530,400 shares. How do total share availability and volume traded affect the overall price? I'll honestly tell you, that information is just plain "over my head."

No. 2 U.S. automaker Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) said Monday it expects to borrow $18 billion and back its loans with collateral for the first time.

The venerable U.S. automaker said it needs the money to continue to implement its major restructuring. CEO Alan Mulally said Ford needs the capital to help pay for a buyout /workforce reduction for 40,000 Ford employees, as well as to pay for additional plant/operational modifications.

Like General Motors Corp. (NYSE:GM), Ford is in the midst of a major transformation, the success of which will have much to say regarding the sustainability of each company. High gasoline prices, and a dearth of innovative cars have propelled consumers to buy foreign vehicles, particularly cars manufactured by Toyota and Honda. Moreover, as with GM, the changes at Ford do not simply amount to developing two or three "must-have cars," although that is daunting enough. Ford and GM also must substantially reduce assembly and employee benefits costs to bring them in-line with foreign competitors, including buying-out selected employees. And buy-outs require capital, hence Ford's Monday bond announcement.

The market's reaction to Ford's announcement? Moody's lowered Ford's unsecured debt rating to Caa1, seven steps below investment grade. Meanwhile, Ford's shares dropped 26 cents to $8.26 in afternoon trading Monday. GM declined 71 cents to $30.52.

Investment Analysis: Is Ford suitable for the typical investor? No. Ford remains a high-risk investment: Ford still must demonstrate that it can leap over several operational hurdles before Wall Street can declare its restructuring a success. Therefore, unless you can tolerate losing a substantial portion of the money you invest in Ford -- a 60%-70% stock price decline, for example -- avoid Ford for now. The investment analysis for GM is slightly more positive, but GM also is a moderate-risk investment, not suitable for conservative investors.

Bill Ford says that the company that bears his family's name can look to Asian sales to help offset the disaster of its North American operations. In the first nine months of 2006, the Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) sales in China more than doubled compared to the same period in 2005.

Ford's problem in China is simple. It has all the same competitors in China that it has in North America, plus some players who are local. Ford's optimism about the world's most populated country in the world is based on a false assumption, which is that it can do better against its rivals in China than it does in its home market of the United States.

VW sold almost 525,000 vehicles in China the first nine months of the year. GM sold 645,000 vehicles there. Honda Motor Company's (NYSE:HMC) sales for the period were 226,000. Toyota Motor Company's (NYSE:TM) were 203,000. Ford lagged with under 115,000 units in the first nine months.

With Ford well behind the other car companies in the large Asian market, Mr. Ford has to be able to do the math. China won't save him.

Douglas McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) has reported its latest quarterly financials, with an all-around expected loss in the billions, naturally. In what seems to be a broken-record syndrome that gets passed continuously from GM to Ford and back again, Ford reported that it lost $5.8 billion in its latest quarter.

Although Ford was widely expected to lose a record amount, the automaker -- which ranks third in overall sales behind General Motors Corporation (NYSE:GM) and Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:TM) -- said that restructuring costs related to the massive employee layoffs and overall employee base restructuring combined with declining sales of its highly-profitable trucks led to the steep loss.

Although this is Ford's largest quarterly loss in 14 years, the automaker is just at the start of a complete overhaul of its employee base and operational and manufacturing strategy. This may mean that Ford jettisons under-performing assets, companies and brands like Jaguar, for example. The automaker needs to slim down what it can and make every division as profitable as possible, as opposed to being in every possible market trying to gain customers en masse as it thought it once could.

Along with that orientation toward high volume has come complex inefficiencies that have so damaged Ford's fortunes recently. Can it recover? Allan Mulally, Ford's new CEO, has a hard job in front of him to make that a reality. Ford shareholders deserve no less than Mulally's absolute best effort.

Auto sales weren't so bad after all! we all agreed, shaking hands and congratulating the industry, feeling a bit smug (despite Toyota's walloping of all things American). And at first blush, it looked to be true: sales at Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) were actually up vs. September 2005, 4.7%, and sales at DaimlerChrysler AG (NYSE:DCX) and General Motors Corporation (NYSE:GM) weren't down as much as many industry watchers feared.

That's all well and good, when you're looking at raw units sold. But Autoblog's John Neff went a little deeper and considered the way auto dealerships operate: in "selling days." September 2006 selling days were 26, vs. only 25 in September 2005. And if you know auto dealerships, the guys behind the desk are really looking at DSR: daily sales rate.

Were we all snookered into placidity by one of the oldest tricks in the car sales guys' book? Here's what John found when he looked at DSR instead of gross sales: