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DELPHI ENERGY $1.40 (Toronto symbol DEE; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative)(403-265-6171; www.delphienergy.ca; Shares outstanding: 155.4 million; Market cap: $217.6 million; No dividends paid) develops, produces and explores for oil and natural gas. About 67% of its output is gas. The remaining 33% is oil.

In the three months ended September 30, 2014, Delphi’s production rose 7.5%, to 9,461 barrels of oil equivalent a day from 8,797 a year earlier. Production was down 9.0% from 10,397 barrels a day in the quarter ended June 30, 2014, but that was due to processing delays caused by outside companies.

Those issues, which were resolved at the end of August, cut Delphi’s production by about 1,700 barrels a day in the latest quarter. Its output averaged 11,500 barrels a day in September and October.

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BIRCHCLIFF ENERGY $9.05 (Toronto symbol BIR; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (403-261-6401; www.birchcliffenergy.com; Shares outstanding: 152.2 million; Market cap: $1.4 billion; No dividends paid) develops, produces and explores for oil and gas, mainly in the Peace River Arch area near the Alberta/B.C. border. About 84% of its output is gas. The remaining 16% is oil.

In the three months ended September 30, 2014, Birchcliff’s production rose 38.8%, to 34,235 barrels of oil equivalent a day from 24,662 a year earlier. Cash flow per share jumped 66.7%, to $0.50 from $0.30, on the increased output and higher gas prices.

Birchcliff recently completed Phase 4 of its gasplant expansion in Pouce Coupe, Alberta. That raised the facility’s capacity by 20% and will let Birchcliff bring the additional gas it is now producing to market.

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MAJOR DRILLING $5.57 (Toronto symbol MDI; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative)(1-866- 264-3986; www.majordrilling.com; Shares outstanding: 80.1 million; Market cap: $446.4 million; Dividend yield: 3.7%) is a large contract-drilling firm that mainly serves the mining industry.

In the three months ended October 31, 2014, Major’s revenue fell 5.5%, to $87.2 million from $92.3 million a year earlier. However, its revenue was up 29.0% from $67.6 million in the previous quarter. The company also reported a loss of $0.13 a share, less than its year-ago loss of $0.24.

Despite the significant mining industry downturn, the company continues to report positive cash flow. That should let it maintain its semi-annual dividend of $0.10 a share, which gives the stock a 3.6% yield.

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BMTC GROUP $16.30 (Toronto symbol GBT.A; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk)(514-648-5757; No website; Shares outstanding: 45.1 million; Market cap: $733.3 million; Dividend yield: 1.5%) is one of Quebec’s biggest retailers of furniture, electronics and appliances, with 36 outlets. It mainly sells these products through its two affiliates: Brault & Martineau and Ameublements Tanguay.

In March 2012, BMTC introduced a new banner, Economax, which offers lower-priced products. The company rebranded four outlets that it had operated as Brault & Martineau liquidation centres.

In 2013, BMTC opened four more EconoMax stores. It added another, in Joliette, in March 2014, and an additional one, in LaSalle, on October 24, 2014. BMTC is now considering purchasing land in Drummondville for a new store that would open in late 2015.

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REITMANS (CANADA) LTD. $6.43 (Toronto symbol RET.A; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (514-384- 1140; www.reitmans.com; Shares outstanding: 64.6 million; Market cap: $410.2 million; Dividend yield: 3.1%) owns 843 women’s clothing stores across Canada.

The chain consists of 343 Reitmans, 141 Penningtons, 107 Smart Set, 105 Addition Elle, 79 RW & Co. and 68 Thyme Maternity stores. It also has 21 Thyme Maternity boutiques in some Canadian Babies “R” Us locations.

In the three months ended November 1, 2014, Reitmans’ sales fell 4.5%, to $238.3 million from $249.4 million a year earlier. Same-store sales increased 0.2%. Sales fell because the company closed 52 underperforming stores.

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WESTJET AIRLINES $32.32 (Toronto symbol WJA; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk)(1-877-493-7853; www.westjet.com; Shares outstanding: 127.8 million; Market cap: $4.2 billion; Div. yield: 1.5%) has jumped to new all-time highs over the past month as fuel prices continue to drop along with oil prices. Fuel makes up around a third of an airline’s operating costs.

Meanwhile, the company’s load factor rose to 80.5% from 79.7% in November 2013. Load factor is the percentage of available seats occupied by paying passengers.

The increase was even more positive considering that the company increased its capacity by 6.9% to meet higher demand. Demand for WestJet’s flights remains high, and the launch of its new Canadian regional airline, WestJet Encore, has also gone well.

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RUSSEL METALS $27.18 (Toronto symbol RUS; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative)(905-819-7777; www.russelmetals.com; Shares outstanding: 61.6 million; Market cap: $1.7 billion; Dividend yield: 5.6%) is one of North America’s largest metal distributors. It serves 39,000 clients at 53 locations in Canada and 12 in the U.S.

In the quarter ended September 30, 2014, Russel’s revenue rose 30.4%, to $1.04 billion from $796.8 million a year earlier. The company’s metal-services business raised its prices in response to higher demand, increasing its revenue by 14%. The energy products division, which supplies pipes for oil and gas drillers, saw its revenue jump 41%.

Earnings gained 74.6%, to $33.0 million, or $0.54 a share. A year earlier, the company earned $18.9 million, or $0.31. Russel has invested in new plants and processing equipment in the past three years, which has cut its costs and improved its efficiency. That’s paying off with higher profit margins.

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GOODYEAR TIRE & RUBBER CO. $27.23 (Nasdaq symbol GT; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (330-796-2122; www.goodyear.com; Shares outstanding: 274.6 million; Market cap: $7.5 billion; Dividend yield: 0.9%) dipped as low as $18.87 in October but has since rebounded. It’s now up 11.5% since we made it our #1 pick for 2014 in our February issue at $24.42. In U.S. dollar terms, the shares have gained 16.9%.

In the quarter ended September 30, 2014, Goodyear’s sales fell 6.9%, to $4.7 billion from $5.0 billion a year earlier. The company sold 2% fewer tires worldwide, including a 4% drop in North America as car dealers stocked up on cheaper Chinese-made tires ahead of an expected U.S. tariff.

But even with the lower revenue, earnings jumped 39.9%, to $242.0 million, or $0.87 a share. A year earlier, it earned $190.0 million, or $0.68 a share.

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INTACT FINANCIAL CORP. $81.73 (Toronto symbol IFC; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (416-341-1464; www.intactfc.com; Shares outstanding: 131.5 million; Market cap: $10.8 billion; Dividend yield: 2.4%) is Canada’s largest provider of property and casualty insurance, based on premiums. Its brands include Intact Insurance, Canada BrokerLink, belairdirect and Grey Power.

In the three months ended September 30, 2014, Intact’s revenue was virtually unchanged from a year earlier, at $1.91 billion. The company earned $204 million, or $1.55 a share, up sharply from $51 million, or $0.39. However, the year-earlier results include a pre-tax loss of $270 million, mostly related to weather. Similar losses in the 2014 quarter were $125 million.

Thanks to the lower catastrophe losses, Intact reported an improved combined ratio, or claims paid out divided by premiums taken in (the lower, the better) of 93.2% in the latest quarter, down from 102.8%.

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Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle for specific tips on stock investing 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 a report on one of the stocks profiled in these Q&A sessions. We give you Pat’s buy-hold-sell recommendation as well as his analysis of the stock. This is part of the specific buy, hold and sell advice we offer you in our daily posts. Every week you get “A Stock to Sell” on Monday, “Best Canadian Stocks” on Tuesday, and “U.S. Stock Picks” on Thursday.

This week we had a question from an Inner Circle Member on a Canadian health care stock. Concordia Health Care takes a different approach from many larger drug firms, preferring to buy mature products as opposed to developing its own treatments. It recently acquired the rights to a second-generation epilepsy drug; its other main drug treats irritable bowel syndrome and enterocolitis. Concordia’s sales and share price have both risen. Pat looks at the challenges the company faces in finding new drugs and fighting off generic competition. Q: Hi: Would you give me your opinion on Concordia Health Care? Thank you.

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Every Thursday we bring you 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.

IBM has a long history of drifting in and out of investor favour, mainly due to fear that new technologies will put it out of business.

However, IBM also has long history of shifting out of slowing businesses into faster-growing fields. For example, as computer prices fell in the 1990s, IBM expanded its more-profitable software and consulting operations. The company later unloaded its struggling personal computer operations, and is now selling its low-end server business. It will invest the proceeds in areas with better long-term potential, such as cloud computing and analytics software.

In addition, IBM’s well-known brand and global salesforce continue to give it a big advantage, particularly in developing countries.

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORP. (New York symbol IBM; www.ibm.com) started up in 1911 making machines that processed U.S. census data, as well as other industrial equipment such as time clocks and scales.

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Every Tuesday we bring you “Best Canadian Stocks.” You get our specific recommendation 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.

CANADIAN TIRE CORP. (Toronto symbol CTC.A; www.canadiantire.ca)operates 492 Canadian Tire stores, which specialize in automotive, household and sporting goods. It also owns other retail chains, such as Mark’s (casual clothing) and SportChek.

The company continues to add new locations and renovate older stores. It’s also benefiting from its 2011 purchase of the Forzani Group of sporting goods stores, including the popular SportChek banner. These moves are helping it compete with U.S.-based retailers like Wal-Mart.

Earlier this year Canadian Tire agreed to sell 20% of its credit card operations to Bank of Nova Scotia for $500 million. The company has an option to sell an additional 29% to the bank over the next 10 years.

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BELL ALIANT INC. $27 (Toronto symbol BA, Conservative Growth Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 227.8 million; Market cap: $6.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.2; Dividend yield: 7.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.bellaliant.ca) ells telephone and Internet services to 2.5 million customers in Atlantic Canada, as well as rural parts of Ontario and Quebec. It also sells wireless services through an alliance with BCE, which owns 45% of Bell Aliant.

The company continues to replace its copper-wire cables with fibre optic lines. This lets it sell more high-speed Internet and digital TV subscriptions, and offset declining sales of its regular phone services, which still supply 60% of its revenue.

Bell Aliant expects to spend $550 million to $600 million on network upgrades in 2012, compared to $573 million in 2011. Its fibre optic systems now reach 621,000 homes. The company plans to increase that to 650,000 by the end of 2012.

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Every Monday we feature “A Stock to Sell” as our daily post. With every stock we recommend as a sell, we give you a full explanation of why we advise against investing in the stock at this time. Adidas AG (ADR) (symbol ADDYY on the U.S. over-the-counter market; www.adidas.com) together with its subsidiaries, develops, makes and markets athletic equipment and clothing worldwide. The company operates through six segments: Wholesale, Retail, TaylorMade-Adidas Golf Company, Rockport, Reebok-CCM Hockey and Other Centrally Managed Brands....

ARC RESOURCES $26.76 (Toronto symbol ARX; Shares outstanding: 317.4 million; Market cap: $8.1 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative; Dividend yield: 4.5%; www.arcresources.com) produces oil and natural gas in Western Canada. Its average daily output of 110,165 barrels of oil equivalent is 60% gas and 40% oil.

In the three months ended June 30, 2014, ARC’s cash flow per share jumped 43.1%, to $0.93 from $0.65 a year earlier.

Production gained 17.9%, even though maintenance on existing wells cost the company an estimated 2,400 barrels a day in the latest quarter. ARC’s realized gas price rose 28.3%. Oil prices increased 14.5%.

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PENGROWTH ENERGY $4.36 (Toronto symbol PGF; Shares outstanding: 528.1 million; Market cap: $2.2 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 11.0%; www.pengrowth.com) produces oil and natural gas in Western Canada and off the Nova Scotia coast. Gas accounts for 46% of its production; the other 54% is oil.

In the three months ended September 30, 2014, Pengrowth produced 72,472 barrels a day (including gas), down 13.0% from 83,275 barrels a year earlier. That’s mainly because it sold several less important oil and gas properties in Western Canada.

Pengrowth is investing the proceeds from these sales in more promising projects, like its Lindbergh oil sands development in Alberta’s Cold Lake region. Lindbergh should start up in early 2015 and produce 12,500 barrels a day. Future phases will raise the project’s daily output to 50,000 barrels.

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TRANSCANADA CORP. $56.86 (Toronto symbol TRP; Shares outstanding: 708.0 million; Market cap: $39.1 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.4%; www.transcanada.com) recently completed the purchase of three more Ontario solar power plants from Canadian Solar Inc. (Nasdaq symbol CSIQ).

TransCanada now owns seven of the nine solar farms it agreed to buy from Canadian Solar in 2011. It will probably take possession of the remaining two in 2015. In all, it will pay about $500 million.

The company has 20-year deals to sell the power from these solar farms, which cuts this investment’s risk.

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ISHARES DEX UNIVERSE BOND INDEX FUND $31.03 (Toronto symbol XBB; buy or sell through brokers) mirrors the performance of the DEX Universe Bond Index. The 833 bonds in the portfolio have an average term-to-maturity of 10.03 years. The fund’s MER is 0.33%.

The bonds in the index are 68.2% government and 31.8% corporate.

The fund yields 3.0%, compared to the Short-Term Bond Fund’s 2.5%. Its yield-to-maturity is 2.37%, 0.80% above the Short-Term Fund. That reflects the added risk of holding long-term bonds.

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ISHARES DEX SHORT-TERM BOND INDEX FUND $28.55 (Toronto symbol XSB; buy or sell through brokers) mirrors the performance of the DEX Short- Term Bond Index.

This index consists of a wide range of investmentgrade federal, provincial, municipal and corporate bonds with between one- and five-year terms to maturity. The fund holds 400 bonds with an average term to maturity of 2.86 years. The bonds in the index are 61.0% government and 39.0% corporate. The fund’s MER is 0.27%.

iShares DEX Short-Term Bond Index Fund yields 2.5%. However, this high yield is due to the fact that some of the fund’s bonds pay above-market interest rates. As a result, they trade above their face value. When these bonds mature, holders will only get the bonds’ face value, which means the portfolio will incur predictable capital losses. These losses will offset some of the appeal of the above-market yields.

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GLOBAL X SILVER MINERS ETF $8.23 (New York symbol SIL; buy or sell through brokers; www.globalxfunds.com) tracks the Solactive Global Silver Miners Index.

This index includes 25 international companies that mine, refine or explore for silver. It was developed by Germany-based Structured Solutions AG.

Canadian firms make up 58.9% of the fund’s holdings, but it also includes miners in the U.S. (13.6%) and Mexico (4.2%). Its MER is 0.65%.

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ISHARES S&P/TSX GLOBAL GOLD INDEX FUND $8.06 (Toronto symbol XGD; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) aims to mirror the performance of the S&P/TSX Global Gold Index.

This index is made up of 40 gold stocks from Canada and around the world. The iShares S&P/TSX Global Gold Index Fund’s MER is 0.61%. It began trading on March 23, 2001.

The fund’s top holdings are Goldcorp at 16.2%; Barrick Gold, 14.7%; Newmont Mining, 9.9%; Franco Nevada, 7.8%; Randgold Resources (ADR), 5.7%; Agnico-Eagle Mines, 5.3%; Eldorado Gold, 4.2%; Royal Gold, 4.0%; Yamana Gold, 3.7%; and AngloGold Ashanti (ADR), 3.5%.

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BANK OF NOVA SCOTIA $67.34 (Toronto symbol BNS; Shares outstanding: 1.2 billion; Market cap: $81.7 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.9%, www.scotiabank.com) may be planning to sell its 35 bank branches and related operations in Puerto Rico. That’s because the island’s sluggish economy and high unemployment continue to hurt loan demand.

Selling this business could raise $600 million U.S., which is equal to 1.0% of Bank of Nova Scotia’s $81.7-billion (Canadian) market cap (or the value of all of its outstanding shares).

The bank would probably invest the proceeds from the sale of the Puerto Rican assets in more promising areas of Latin America, such as Chile and Colombia.

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INNERGEX RENEWABLE ENERGY $10.80 (Toronto symbol INE; Shares outstanding: 100.4 million; Market cap: $1.1 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield 5.6%; www.innergex.com) operates 26 hydroelectric plants, six wind farms and one solar power facility in Quebec, Ontario, B.C. and Idaho. The company gets 73% of its power from hydroelectric plants. Wind supplies 26% and solar generates 1%. In contrast to Brookfield, Innergex is growing slowly, mostly by building its own hydroelectric and wind facilities, rather than through acquisitions. Right now, it has five projects under construction.

But like Brookfield, Innergex makes sure it has firm long-term power-purchase contracts in place before it starts building new facilities.

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BROOKFIELD RENEWABLE ENERGY PARTNERS L.P. $34.33 (Toronto symbol BEP.UN; Units outstanding: 265.2 million; Market cap: $9.2 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 5.1%; www.brookfieldrenewable.com) owns 196 hydroelectric generating stations, 11 wind farms and two natural-gas-fired plants. In all, it has 6,700 megawatts of generating capacity.

Roughly 31% of that capacity is in Canada, with another 52% in the U.S. and 17% in Brazil.

In the quarter ended September 30, 2014, Brookfield’s cash flow per share fell 46.3%, to $0.22 from $0.41 a year earlier. That’s because below-normal rainfall slowed the company’s hydroelectric production. However, rainfall averages out over time: in the nine months ended September 30, cash flow per share fell just 4.1%, to $1.65 from $1.72.

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IBM $161.82 (New York symbol IBM; Shares outstanding: 997.6 million; Market cap: $197.9 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 2.7%; www.ibm.com) is handing over its computer chip manufacturing operations to Globalfoundries Inc. IBM will not receive any payment for these assets. Instead, it will pay Globalfoundries $1.5 billion to take over this money-losing business. IBM has also agreed to buy chips from Globalfoundries for the next 10 years.

This move is part of IBM’s plan to focus on its more profitable computer services and software divisions, which should spur its earnings as the economy rebounds. Meanwhile, its $4.40-ashare dividend seems safe and yields 2.7%.

IBM is a buy.

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