The Iconoclast Investor

Get ready for the media blitz.

“It’s time to stop America’s addiction to foreign oil.” So said millions of dollars worth of print ads taken out in newspapers across the country last Tuesday. In a full-page photo of a bright blue sky and a series of wind turbines the ad stated its case. “In 1970, we imported 25% of our oil. Today, it’s 70% and climbing. We will send $700 billion to foreign countries this year. Money that is building their countries. Not ours.” That’s a powerful point. The man making it? Oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens.

Last week he launched his “Pickens Plan,” a media campaign to get renewable energy policy entrenched in the next administration’s thinking.

One thing is for certain–Pickens is nothing if not practical. During the last 40 years, he wasn’t tilting for windmills; he was busy building his $3 billion fortune in oil and natural gas-not renewables. And four years ago, he bankrolled the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth campaign against Senator John Kerry, of Massachusetts, who had proposed a wide-reaching renewable energy plan similar to what Pickens is now proposing. (One odd aside to that saga–Federal Election Commission records show Pickens previously had been a repeat contributor to Kerry’s senate campaigns–one of the few Democrats he’s ever supported.)

The difference, of course, is that Pickens now has a significant interest in shifting policy toward renewables such as wind power and natural gas. He is in the process of building what would be the world’s largest wind farm, a $10 billion project spread over 200,000 acres of Texas panhandle and he has accumulated big financial interests in many natural gas-related companies.

However you feel about Pickens’ political actions, in investing the smart move is to step back from emotional reactions and take hints from what the smart money is doing.

This is taken from the July 14 issue of Cabot Wealth Advisory written by Brendan Coffey.