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MOTOROLA SOLUTIONS INC. $68 (New York symbol MSI; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 219.8 million; Market cap: $14.9 billion; Priceto- sales ratio: 2.5; Dividend yield: 2.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.motorolasolutions.com) recently sold its enterprise division for $3.45 billion. This business makes a variety of electronics, such as bar-code scanners and kiosks, for corporate clients.

The company now focuses on specialized communications equipment, such as radios for police and fire vehicles. Its sales fell 5.6%, to $5.9 billion in 2014 from $6.2 billion in 2013, due to weaker demand in North America and Asia. Earnings per share dropped 33.2%, to $2.58 from $3.86.

The stock has risen recently on speculation that Motorola Solutions is considering selling itself. However, it could drop suddenly if a suitable offer fails to materialize.

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NORDSTROM INC. $81 (New York symbol JWN; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 190.1 million; Market cap: $15.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.2; Dividend yield: 1.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.nordstrom.com) has raised its quarterly dividend by 12.1%, to $0.37 a share from $0.33. The new annual rate of $1.48 yields 1.8%.

The company sells upscale clothing and shoes, so it’s less vulnerable to changes in the overall economy. Still, it should benefit as low gasoline prices give consumers more cash for other goods. Meanwhile, the high U.S. dollar cuts the cost of goods it imports from overseas.

Nordstrom is a buy.

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DIEBOLD INC. $36 (New York symbol DBD; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 64.7 million; Market cap: $2.3 billion; Priceto- sales ratio: 0.8; Dividend yield: 3.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.diebold.com) is a leading maker of automated teller machines. It also makes safes, vaults and building-security systems.

Thanks to a major cost-cutting plan, Diebold’s earnings rose 27.2%, to $1.73 a share in 2014 from $1.36 in 2013. Revenue rose 6.8%, to $3.05 billion from $2.86 billion.

Diebold gets 55% of its revenue from outside of North America, so the high U.S. dollar will probably cause its revenue to fall about 5% in 2015.

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PFIZER INC. $35 (New York symbol PFE; Income Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 6.3 billion; Market cap: $220.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 4.4; Dividend yield: 3.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.pfizer.com) has received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for new breast cancer drug palbociclib. Pfizer will market this treatment under the Ibrance brand.

Ibrance will probably contribute $4 billion to the company’s annual revenue by 2020; last year, Pfizer’s revenue was $49.6 billion.

The company spends a high 17% of its revenue on research. This hurts its short-term earnings but lets it develop innovative drugs like Ibrance. New treatments like these help Pfizer offset sales of other drugs that have lost their patent protection, like Lipitor (cholesterol) and Celebrex (arthritis).

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CEDAR FAIR L.P. $56 (New York symbol FUN; Income Portfolio, Consumer sector; Units outstanding: 55.9 million; Market cap: $3.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.8; Dividend yield: 5.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.cedarfair.com) owns 11 amusement parks, three outdoor water parks, one indoor water park and five hotels.

Cedar Fair reported record revenue of $1.16 billion in 2014, up 2.2% from $1.13 billion in 2013. If you exclude the sale of a water park in 2013, attendance was flat. However, spending per guest rose 3%, while out-of-park spending (hotels adjacent to its parks) gained 2%. Higher labour costs and spending on new attractions cut its earnings by 4.1%, to $1.86 a unit from $1.94.

The partnership recently raised its quarterly distribution by 7.1%, to $0.75 from $0.70. The new annual rate of $3.00 yields 5.4%.

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BUCKEYE PARTNERS L.P. $77 (New York symbol BPL; Income Portfolio, Utilities sector; Units outstanding: 127.0 million; Market cap: $9.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.5; Dividend yield: 5.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.buckeye.com) operates over 9,600 kilometres of pipelines in the northeastern and midwestern U.S. Its network pumps gasoline, jet fuel and other petroleum products. The partnership also owns oil and gas storage terminals.

Buckeye continues to expand by acquisition. In December 2013, it paid Hess Corp. (New York symbol HES) $850 million for 19 oil-storage terminals on the U.S. east coast and one on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia. It now has over 120 terminals.

In September 2014, it paid $860 million for 80% of a new firm that operates several oil-processing plants on the U.S. Gulf Coast. The deal included a deepwater oil-transfer terminal in Corpus Christi, Texas, as well as storage tanks and pipelines.

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MOLSON COORS BREWING CO. $76 (New York symbol TAP; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 193.0 million; Market cap: $14.7 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.4; Dividend yield: 2.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.molsoncoors.com) reported that its worldwide beer volumes fell 1.3% in 2014. Its revenue also declined 1.4%, to $4.1 billion from $4.2 billion in 2013. If you disregard unfavourable currency exchange rates, revenue gained 0.3%.

The company continues to improve its efficiency. As a result, its earnings rose 5.7%, to $768.5 million from $727.1 million. Per-share earnings gained 4.6%, to $4.13 from $3.95, on more shares outstanding.

Molson Coors’ improving earnings let it cut its long-term debt to $2.3 billion (or 15% of its market cap) from $3.2 billion at the end of 2013. The company has also raised its dividend by 10.8%. The new annual rate of $1.64 yields 2.2%.

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DIAGEO PLC ADRs $118 (New York symbol DEO; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; ADRs outstanding: 627.8 million; Market cap: $74.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 4.7; Dividend yield: 2.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.diageo.com) is the world’s largest premium alcoholic beverage company. Its major brands include Guinness stout, Smirnoff vodka, Johnnie Walker whisky and Captain Morgan rum.

The company recently agreed to acquire the 50% of Don Julio tequila that it doesn’t already own from Casa Cuervo in exchange for its Bushmills Irish whisky business. Diageo will also get $408 million when it completes the deal later this year.

Gaining full control over Don Julio is part of Diageo’s plan to use premium brands to expand in emerging markets. It will use the cash to pay down its debt, which totalled 8.5 billion British pounds (1 pound = $1.93 Canadian) on December 31, 2014.

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T. ROWE PRICE GROUP INC. $84 (Nasdaq symbol TROW; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 260.7 million; Market cap: $21.9 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 5.5; Dividend yield: 2.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.troweprice .com) sells mutual funds and wealth management services.

In 2014, the company earned $1.23 billion, or $4.55 a share. That’s up 17.4% from $1.05 billion, or $3.90 a share, in 2013. Revenue gained 14.3%, to $4.0 billion from $3.5 billion.

On December 31, 2014, the company had a record $746.8 billion of assets under management, up 7.9% from $692.4 billion at the end of 2013. About 93% of that increase came from higher stock prices. The company’s fee income varies with the value of the assets it manages, so it gains from rising stock markets. Higher mutual fund sales (net of redemptions) supplied the remaining 7%.

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VISA INC. $273 (New York symbol V; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 616.0 million; Market cap: $168.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 13.2; Dividend yield: 0.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.visa.com) operates the world’s largest electronic payments network, through which it processes credit, debit, prepaid and commercial transactions.

In its fiscal 2015 first quarter, which ended December 31, 2014, Visa’s earnings rose 11.5%, to $1.6 billion from $1.4 billion a year earlier. Per-share earnings gained 15.0%, to $2.53 from $2.20, on fewer shares outstanding.

Revenue rose 7.2%, to $3.4 billion from $3.2 billion. The company gets half of its revenue from outside the U.S. Without the negative impact of currency exchange rates, revenue gained 9%. Visa processed 17.6 billion transactions in the quarter, up 10.1% from a year earlier.

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FAIR ISAAC CORP. $84 (New York symbol FICO; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 31.4 million; Market cap: $2.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.3; Dividend yield: 0.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.fico.com) makes FICO Scores, a computer program that helps businesses make better decisions about customer creditworthiness. FICO Scores dominates this niche market. Fair Isaac also sells software that helps credit card issuers cut fraud and analyze cardholders’ spending patterns.

In its fiscal 2015 first quarter, which ended December 31, 2014, Fair Isaac’s revenue rose 2.8%, to $189.6 million from $184.3 million a year earlier.

The company saw higher sales at its applications division (66% of revenue) on increased licensing revenue from software that detects bank fraud. Sales of credit-scoring software and programs for analyzing large amounts of a business’s data were lower, mostly due to a big order in the year-ago quarter.

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DUN & BRADSTREET CORP. $135 (New York symbol DNB; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 35.9 million; Market cap: $4.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.9; Dividend yield: 1.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.dnb.com) provides credit reports on over 240 million companies. Its clients use this information to make lending and buying decisions.

Credit reports supply 63% of Dun & Bradstreet’s revenue. The remaining 27% comes from other information products, such as software that helps businesses manage websites and customer data.

In 2014, revenue rose 1.7%, to $1.68 billion from $1.65 billion in 2013. All regions saw gains: North America (74% of revenue), up 1.2%; Europe (15%), up 4.1%; and Asia (11%), up 1.9%.

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BROADRIDGE FINANCIAL SERVICES INC. $54 (New York symbol BR; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 120.9 million; Market cap: $6.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.5; Dividend yield: 2.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.broadridge.com) serves the investment industry in three main areas: investor communications, securities processing and transaction clearing. It processes 90% of all proxy votes in the U.S. and Canada.

Without one-time items, Broadridge earned $39.9 million, or $0.32 a share, in its fiscal 2015 second quarter, which ended December 31, 2014. That’s up 27.9% from $31.2 million, or $0.25 a share, a year earlier. The company continues to add new clients and is doing a good job of holding on to existing ones. Revenue gained 10.4%, to $574.6 million from $520.6 million.

Broadridge typically makes half of its profits in its fourth quarter, which ends June 30. This is the busiest time for processing proxies and annual reports.

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RESTAURANT BRANDS INTERNATIONAL INC. $43 (New York symbol QSR; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 467.1 million; Market cap: $20.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 14.2; Dividend yield: 0.8%.; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.rbi.com) took its current form on December 12, 2014, as a result of Burger King Worldwide’s (old symbol BKW) takeover of Tim Hortons Inc. (old symbol THI).

Restaurant Brands now has 14,372 Burger King restaurants and 4,671 Tim Hortons outlets in over 100 countries.

In the three months ended December 31, 2014, the company lost $514.2 million, or $2.52 a share, compared to a profit of $66.8 million, or $0.19, a year earlier. Without merger-related costs and other unusual items, gross earnings before depreciation, interest and taxes gained 23.1%.

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WAL-MART STORES INC. $84 (New York symbol WMT; Conservative Growth Portfolio: Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 3.2 billion; Market cap: $268.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.6; Dividend yield: 2.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.walmart.com) gets about 60% of its sales from its 4,516 stores in the U.S., including 3,407 supercentres, which sell both groceries and general merchandise. Groceries now supply 56% of Wal-Mart’s U.S. sales.

In 1991, the company opened its first store outside of the U.S. through a joint venture with a Mexican retailer. Its international division (29% of total sales) now operates 6,290 stores in 26 countries.

The remaining 11% of Wal-Mart’s sales comes from its Sam’s Club warehouse stores. The company charges customers a $45 annual membership fee to shop at these stores, which sell a variety of goods at wholesale prices. There are currently 647 Sam’s Club stores in the U.S. and other countries.

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Nearly 50% of Canadians do not have a Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA). And many of those that do are not making regular contributions. This is a shame. It means that many are missing out on a savings plan that can contribute substantially to building wealth and accumulating a strong cash reserve that’s there when you need it.

Since their inception in 2009 tax free savings accounts have given Canadians an excellent opportunity to earn investment income, on interest, dividends and capital gains, tax free.

To ensure that you can take the greatest possible advantage of your TFSA, noted financial columnist Jonathan Chevreau and I have assembled a special report, Make the Most of Your Tax Free Savings Account.

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Telus continues to upgrade its wireless and Internet services, spending $2.2 billion on these improvements in 2014. That’s helping it attract more subscribers in a highly competitive market.

As well, last year the company bought $1.1 billion worth of wireless frequencies, or spectrum that should let it cover more of Canada, particularly smaller cities and rural areas.

TELUS (Toronto symbol T; www.telus.com) gets 55% of its revenue from its 8.0 million wireless subscribers across Canada. It also has 3.2 million phone customers, 1.5 million high-speed Internet users and 888,000 TV subscribers.

Telus also continues to expand its health care division, which helps doctors, pharmacies and hospitals convert patient records and other information to electronic formats.

In September 2014, the company paid an undisclosed sum for ZRx Prescriber, an app that lets doctors write prescriptions through their tablet computers and smartphones. The app can also access a patient’s drug-insurance information, which speeds up claims and cuts down on errors. Over 520 clinics in Ontario and Quebec use ZRx Prescriber to process 400,000 prescriptions a month.

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Every Monday we feature “A Stock to Sell” as our daily post. With every stock or investment we recommend as a sell, we give you a full explanation of why we advise against investing in it at this time.

Metalore Resources (symbol MET on Toronto; www.metaloreresources.com) produces natural gas in Southwestern Ontario. It owns or controls approximately 40,000 of petroleum, natural gas and mineral leases in Norfolk County.

Right now, the company is producing gas from 85 wells. It also distributes gas to 85 businesses and consumers along its gathering pipelines through an agreement with Union Gas Ltd.

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Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle on specific stock picks as well as questions on investment strategy and the economy. Every week, his comments and recommendations on the most intriguing questions of the past week go out to all Inner Circle members. And each week, we offer you one of the highlights from these Q&A sessions. While we reserve our buy-hold-sell advice for Inner Circle members, these excerpts provide a great deal of information and analysis on stocks we’ve covered for members of Pat’s Inner Circle.

This week an Inner Circle Member asked us about a stock that has risen and fallen sharply in the past year. AutoCanada has almost four dozen franchised auto dealerships across Canada and continues to add more through takeovers. While the company has benefited from a rebound in car sales, it also faces several challenges in a cyclical, competitive business. Pat examines the risk of its growth-by-acquisition strategy and the potential impact of lower oil prices on Western Canadian car sales.

Q: Pat: I am a new member and I have a question. What is your current view of AutoCanada? Thanks.

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Every Thursday we bring you one of our best U.S. stock picks. You get our specific recommendation on the stocks we profile, with a full explanation of how we arrived at our opinion. You will read about stocks making moves you should know about, most often from coverage in our newsletter on U.S. investing, Wall Street Stock Forecaster. Over 30 billion devices—including things like home thermostats and appliances—will be connected to the Internet by 2020....

Every Wednesday, we publish our “Investor Toolkit” series on TSI Network. Whether you’re a beginning or experienced investor, these weekly updates are designed to give you specific investment tips and stock market advice. Each Investor Toolkit update gives you a fundamental piece of investment advice, and shows you how you can put it into practice right away.

Today’s tip: “Despite their promise to ease your tax burden on withdrawals, RRSP meltdown strategies are usually more lucrative for brokers than for investors.”

Investors sometimes ask us what we think of the so-called “RRSP meltdown.” This is a strategy that would let them make withdrawals from their RRSPs without paying income tax.

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Every Tuesday we bring you “Best Canadian Stocks.” You get our specific recommendations on the stocks we profile, with a full explanation of how we arrived at our opinion. You’ll read about stocks making moves you should know about, from coverage in one of our three newsletters featuring Canadian stocks—The Successful Investor, Stock Pickers Digest and Canadian Wealth Advisor.

ANDREW PELLER LTD. (Toronto symbol ADW.A; www.andrewpeller.com) is Canada’s second-largest producer of wines, after Vincor International. Its wineries in Nova Scotia, Ontario and British Columbia account for 13.4% of the Canadian wine market.

In the second quarter of its 2015 fiscal year, which ended September 30, 2014, Peller’s sales rose 7.2%, to $82.8 million from $77.2 million a year earlier. That’s mainly because the company started selling its Wayne Gretzky wines in Western Canada. The company also launched several new products, including its skinnygrape spritzers and Panama Jack cocktails.

Earnings jumped 45.5%, to $5.1 million, or $0.37 a share, from $3.5 million, or $0.25.

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TEMPUR SEALY $55.01 (New York symbol TPX; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative)(800-878-8889; www.tempursealy.com; Shares outstanding: 60.9 million; Market cap: $3.4 billion; No dividends paid) completed its $1.3- billion purchase of rival Sealy in 2013. This was a major acquisition for Tempur Sealy (formerly Tempur- Pedic), but it has let the company diversify into traditional spring-coil beds.

The purchase is also helping Tempur Sealy offset rising competition in its current business; the company makes and distributes mattresses and neck pillows made of its Tempur material, which conforms to the body to provide support and alleviate pressure points.

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WYNDHAM WORLDWIDE $91.39 (New York symbol WYN; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (973- 753-6000; www.wyndhamworldwide.com; Shares outstanding: 123.3 million; Market cap: $10.9 billion; Dividend yield: 1.5%) is one of the world’s largest hospitality companies, with 7,650 franchised hotels and over 661,000 rooms worldwide.

Wyndham also manages vacation resorts, rental properties, luxury clubs and time-shares. The company now has 107,000 vacation-rental properties in 100 countries.

In the three months ended December 31, 2014, Wyndham’s revenue rose 3.0%, to $1.23 billion from $1.20 billion a year earlier. The company gets most of its revenue from vacation rather than business travel, and vacation bookings rose in the latest quarter. That helped push up its occupancy rate by 3.1%.

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BROADRIDGE FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS $52.97 (New York symbol BR; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (201-714-3000; www.broadridge.com; Shares outstanding: 120.0 million; Market cap: $6.4 billion; Dividend yield: 2.0%)continues to hit new all-time highs after reporting strong quarterly results.

Without one-time items, Broadridge earned $39.9 million, or $0.32 a share, in its fiscal 2015 second quarter, which ended December 31, 2014. That’s up 27.9% from $31.2 million, or $0.25 a share, a year earlier. The company continues to add new clients and is doing a good job of holding on to existing ones.

Revenue gained 10.4%, to $574.6 million from $520.6 million.

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