Spread Your Finance Risk with These Three

Article Excerpt

Many investors limit their holdings in the Finance sector of their portfolio to Canada’s big five banks. While we have a high opinion of the banks, and recommend that every investor own at least one of them, we also advise investors to look beyond them. Here are three non-bank financial services stocks that we see as buys for long-term gains. However, only two are suitable for conservative investors. GREAT-WEST LIFECO INC. $29 (Toronto symbol GWO; SI Rating: Above average) is Canada’s largest insurance company, with assets under administration of $174.1 billion. Power Financial Corp. owns 75% of the company’s stock. In the three months ended September 30, 2005, Great-West earned $421 million, up 1.7% from $414 million a year earlier. However, per-share income remained unchanged at $0.47 a share. If you exclude a restructuring charge and extra provisions for claims related to hurricanes in the United States, the company would have earned $0.51 a share in the most recent quarter. Revenue rose 5.1%,…