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BANK OF MONTREAL $82 (Toronto symbol BMO; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 649.0 million; Market cap: $53.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.5; Dividend yield: 3.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.bmo.com) is Canada’s fourth-largest bank, with $586.8 billion of assets.

In July 2011, the bank paid $4.1 billion for Milwaukee-based Marshall & Ilsley. The move doubled the size of its U.S. retail banking business, which now supplies 15% of its total earnings. Thanks to cost cuts and an improving U.S.

economy, this division will likely earn $686 million in fiscal 2014, up 8.7% from 2013. The bank aims to raise that to at least $750 million in 2015.

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BANK OF NOVA SCOTIA $69 (Toronto symbol BNS; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.2 billion; Market cap: $82.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.7; Dividend yield: 3.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.scotiabank.com) is the third-largest bank in Canada, with $791.5 billion of assets.

In the quarter ended July 31, 2014, the bank’s earnings rose 38.5%, to $2.3 billion from $1.6 billion a year earlier. Per-share profits gained 36.0%, to $1.85 from $1.36, on more shares outstanding.

The latest earnings included a $555-million gain on the sale of most of Bank of Nova Scotia’s stake in mutual fund operator CI Financial Corp. (Toronto symbol CIX). Without that, the bank earned $1.40 a share. Revenue rose 17.6%, to $6.5 billion from $5.5 billion.

Bank of Nova Scotia set aside $398 million to cover potential bad loans in the latest quarter, up 26.8% from $314 million a year earlier. That’s mainly due to rising credit card balances, more car loans and higher provisions for commercial loans in the Caribbean and Latin America.

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ROYAL BANK OF CANADA $82 (Toronto symbol RY; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.4 billion; Market cap: $114.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.9; Dividend yield: 3.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.rbc.com) is Canada’s second-largest bank, with $913.9 billion of assets.

In the three months ended July 31, 2014, the bank earned $2.4 billion, up 10.2% from $2.2 billion a year earlier. Per-share earnings rose 11.0%, to $1.62 from $1.46, on fewer shares outstanding. These figures exclude unusual items, such as a $40-million loss on the sale of its Jamaican banking operations.

Revenue jumped 25.2%, to $9.0 billion from $7.2 billion. The bank set aside $283 million to cover bad loans in the latest quarter, up 6.0%, from $267 million. That’s mainly due to higher provisions at its Caribbean and Canadian corporate-lending businesses. The strong results prompted Royal to raise its quarterly dividend by 5.6%, to $0.75 a share from $0.71. The new annual rate of $3.00 yields 3.7%.

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TORONTO-DOMINION BANK $57 (Toronto symbol TD; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.8 billion; Market cap: $102.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.0; Dividend yield: 3.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.td.comtarget=”_blank”) is Canada’s largest bank, with $921.8 billion of assets.

TD continues to benefit from its recent deal with Aimia (Toronto symbol AIM) to become the main credit card issuer for the popular Aeroplan travelreward program. The bank’s insurance operations also benefited from a 32% drop in claims in the latest quarter.

As a result, TD’s earnings jumped 36.8% in the three months ended July 31, 2014, to $2.2 billion from $1.6 billion a year earlier. Per-share profits gained 40.2%, to $1.15 from $0.82. These figures exclude unusual items, such as costs related to the new Aeroplan business.

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ENCANA CORP. $21 (Toronto symbol ECA; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 741.1 million; Market cap: $15.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.3; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.encana.com) recently narrowed its focus from around 30 unconventional natural gas properties to just six. These fields also produce significant amounts of oil and natural gas liquids, such as butane and propane.

The company now expects that liquids will account for 75% of next year’s operating cash flow, two years ahead of its original target.

Encana’s revenue rose 31.8%, from $6.7 billion in 2009 to $8.9 billion in 2010 (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). It then fell to $5.2 billion in 2012. However, revenue recovered to $5.9 billion in 2013 and could reach $7.0 billion in 2014.

Earnings dropped from $2.35 a share (or a total of $1.8 billion) in 2009 to $0.54 a share (or $398 million) in 2011. They then rebounded to $1.35 a share (or $997 million) in 2012, but fell to $1.09 a share (or $802 million) in 2013.

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CENOVUS ENERGY INC. $29 (Toronto symbol CVE; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 757.1 million; Market cap: $22.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.0; Dividend yield: 3.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.cenovus.comtarget=”_blank”) gets 40% of its revenue from its oil sands projects and conventional oil and gas wells in western Canada. These properties’ reserves should last 24 years.

Refining supplies the remaining 60% of Cenovus’s revenue. The company ships its oil to its 50%-owned refineries in Illinois and Texas. Phillips 66 (New York symbol PSX) owns the other 50% of these operations.

Thanks to higher production and oil prices, Cenovus’s revenue increased 62.0%, from $11.5 billion in 2009 to $18.7 billion in 2013. Even with the recent oil price decline, its revenue should rise to around $20 billion in 2014.

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Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle for specific stock tips 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 an Inner Circle Member asked us about a Canadian company that’s an international leader in the aircraft parts industry. Héroux-Devtek is the world’s third-largest maker of landing gear for aircraft, with clients such as Boeing, Embraer and Bombardier. Pat considers the company’s rising earnings in light of a recent acquisition and a new contract with Boeing. He also looks at the impact of shrinking military budgets around the globe on Héroux-Devtek’s prospects.

Q: Pat: What is your opinion on Héroux-Devtek Inc.? Best regards.

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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. Procter & Gamble’s sales have slowed in recent years, mainly due to competition from cheaper generic brands. In response, the company is eliminating less profitable household goods and cutting costs. It’s also doing a good job of developing new products and finding new markets for existing ones. These moves will give Procter more room to adjust its prices without hurting its profit margins. They’ll also provide more cash for share buybacks and dividend hikes....

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.

Maple Leaf Foods is nearing the end of its multi-year plan to unload less profitable businesses and modernize its meat-processing plants. The plan’s costs have depressed the company’s current earnings, but it greatly improves its longer-term prospects.

MAPLE LEAF FOODS INC. (Toronto symbol MFI; www.mapleleaf.ca) is Canada’s largest foodprocessing company. It mainly sells its products, including fresh and prepared meats and poultry, under the Maple Leaf and Schneider brands.

In May 2014, the company sold its 90.0% stake in Canada Bread, Canada’s second-largest producer of baked goods after Weston Bakery. It received $1.66 billion for this holding.

Meanwhile, Maple Leaf continues to make progress with a major restructuring of its meat-processing operations, which mainly involves closing older plants and shifting their operations to newer facilities. The company expects to complete the plan by the end of 2015.

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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. LifeLogger Technologies (symbol LOGG on the U.S. over-the-counter market; www.lifelogger.com) is a Florida company that aims to market its gum-packet-sized LifeLogger wearable camera....

Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle for specific stock investing advice 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 “Our Top U.S. Stocks” on Thursday.

Recently an Inner Circle member asked us about Parkland Fuel, a company that sells gasoline and operates convenience stores through its own brands and under license to bigger companies like Imperial Oil. Parkland recently lost a major supply contract with Suncor Energy and Pat examines the company’s attempts to replace that business with new acquisitions. He also looks at the impact of lower oil prices on Parkland’s profits.

Q: Hi Pat: Could you give us an update on Parkland Fuels? They are continuing to make acquisitions, and the stock continues to rise. Would you consider it a buy now? Regards.

A: Parkland Fuel Corp. (symbol PKI on Toronto; www.parkland.ca) operates gas stations, convenience stores and a fuel distribution business, mostly in Western Canada and Ontario. It was called Parkland Income Fund before it converted to a dividend-paying corporation on December 31, 2010.

The company owns 144 rural gas stations and convenience stores. Brands include Fas Gas Plus, Race Trac Gas and Short Stop. Many of Parkland’s stations sell propane in addition to gasoline and diesel fuel. The company also operates Esso stations in Western Canada and Ontario under a licensing deal with Imperial Oil (symbol IMO on Toronto). It recently signed an agreement to use the Chevron brand in B.C.

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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.

This company provides vital services in the investment industry. It’s a market leader with a well-established brand, which makes it hard for competitors to lure away its customers.

BROADRIDGE FINANCIAL SERVICES INC. (New York symbol BR; www.broadridge.com)serves the investment industry in three main areas: investor communications, securities processing and transaction clearing. The company processes 85% of all proxy votes in the U.S.

Without one-time items, Broadridge earned $0.30 a share in its fiscal 2015 first quarter, which ended September 30, 2014. That’s down 23.1% from $0.39 a year earlier. The decline came from higher compensation, plus expanded sales and marketing costs, related to new business.

Overall revenue gained 1.9%, to $555.8 million from $545.2 million. Revenue from contracts that pay recurring fees rose 4% and accounted for two-thirds of the total. The remaining third comes from one-time events, such as notifications of special shareholder meetings and distributing information when mutual funds change managers.

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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: “While stock options frequently make a lot of money for brokers, but most investors are more likely to lose with options. Here are seven ways they can cost you money.”...

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.

BROOKFIELD RENEWABLE ENERGY PARTNERS L.P. (Toronto symbol BEP.UN; 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....

T. ROWE PRICE GROUP INC. $83 (www.troweprice.com) earned $1.12 a share in the third quarter of 2014, up 12.0% from $1.00 a year earlier. Revenue rose 15.4%, to $1.0 billion from $884.4 million. Assets under management have risen 5.6% since the start of 2014, to $731.2 billion....

AMEREN CORP. $43 (www.ameren.com) has raised its quarterly dividend by 2.5%, to $0.41 a share from $0.40. The new annual rate of $1.64 yields 3.8%. Ameren should benefit from recent rate increases at its gas-distribution operations. However, most of its power plants burn coal, so it will have to convert them to gas and other fuels to comply with tougher environmental regulations....

GENUINE PARTS CO. $102 (www.genpt.com) earned $1.24 a share in the quarter ended September 30, 2014, up 10.7% from $1.12 a year earlier. Sales rose 8.2%, to a record $4.0 billion from $3.7 billion. Sales at its auto parts business (52% of the total) rose 4.1%....

VISA INC. $257 (New York symbol V; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 620.0 million; Market cap: $159.3 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 12.8; 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. Visa gets most of its revenue from fees it charges the card issuers and merchants that use its network. It bases these fees on transaction volumes and other factors. The banks that issue the cards are responsible for evaluating customer creditworthiness and collecting payments, not Visa.

Thanks to the continued growth of online shopping, which has encouraged more credit and debit card use, Visa’s revenue rose 57.5%, from $8.1 billion in fiscal 2010 to $12.7 billion in 2014 (fiscal years end September 30).

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BAXTER INTERNATIONAL INC. $72 (New York symbol BAX; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 542.0 million; Market cap: $39.0 billion; Priceto- sales ratio: 2.4; Dividend yield: 2.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.baxter.com) earned $1.35 a share in the three months ended September 30, 2014, up 8.9% from $1.24 a year earlier. Sales rose 13.1%, to $4.2 billion from $3.7 billion.

Baxter’s medical products business (60% of total revenue) reported 17.2% higher sales, thanks to Gambro, a dialysisequipment maker the company bought for $3.9 billion in September 2013. Without Gambro, medical product sales rose 5%.

Sales at the BioScience division (40% of the total) gained 7.5%, mainly due to stronger demand for its Advate hemophilia drug.

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IDEXX LABORATORIES INC. $149 (Nasdaq symbol IDXX; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 47.7 million; Market cap: $7.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 5.2; No dividends paid; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.idexx.com) earned $1.05 a share in the quarter ended September 30, 2014, up 25.0% from $0.84 a year earlier. Sales rose 13.4%, to $383.5 million from $338.3 million.

These gains are mainly because veterinarians are buying more of Idexx’s equipment for detecting diseases in pets. That’s also spurring more demand for consumable products that vets must continuously replenish.

However, the stock has jumped 40% since the start of 2014 and now trades at a high 38.4 times the $3.88 a share that Idexx will likely earn over the full year.

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APACHE CORP. $72 (New York symbol APA; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 376.8 million; Market cap: $27.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.9; Dividend yield: 1.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.apachecorp.com) is selling some of its less important oil and gas properties in Texas and Oklahoma.

It will receive $1.4 billion when it completes the sale by the end of 2014. To put that in context, Apache earned $528 million, or $1.38 a share, in the three months ended September 30, 2014.

The company will probably invest the cash in its more promising shale oil properties in the U.S. Apache is a hold.

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DIEBOLD INC. $36 (New York symbol DBD; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 64.6 million; Market cap: $2.3 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.8; Dividend yield: 3.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www. diebold.com) aims to save a total of $150 million by the end of 2015, mainly through layoffs and plant closures.

In the third quarter of 2014, the company earned $33.0 million, or $0.51 a share, up from a year-earlier loss of $21.7 million, or $0.34. Without unusual items, earnings per share fell 3.6%, to $0.54 from $0.56.

Sales gained 8.9%, to $768.0 million from $705.4 million. Stronger demand for automated teller machines in Europe and Asia offset slower sales in North America and Latin America. Diebold also sold more security systems.

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FRONTIER COMMUNICATIONS CORP. $7.06 (Nasdaq symbol FTR; Income Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 1.0 billion; Market cap: $7.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.5; Dividend yield: 5.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.frontier.com) recently paid $2.0 billion for AT&T’s traditional phone business in Connecticut. The company now has 3.0 million residential and business customers in 28 states.

Excluding acquisition-related costs, Frontier earned $47.7 million, or $0.05 a share, in the third quarter of 2014. That’s down 15.6% from $56.5 million, or $0.06 a share, a year earlier. Even with the AT&T operations, revenue fell 3.7%, to $1.14 billion from $1.19 billion, as lower telephone revenue offset higher sales of Internet services.

The company borrowed most of the cash it needed for this purchase, which increased its long-term debt to $9.2 billion, or 1.3 times its market cap.

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WINDSTREAM HOLDINGS INC. $10 (Nasdaq symbol WIN; Income Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 602.8 million; Market cap: $6.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.0; Dividend yield: 10.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.windstream.com) gets 73% of its revenue by selling high-speed Internet and other communication services to 357,700 businesses.

The other 27% comes from selling phone, Internet and video services to 3.2 million residential customers, mainly in the rural U.S.

In July 2014, the company announced that it would transfer its fibre optic and copper networks, some land and buildings to a new real estate investment trust (REIT). Windstream will then lease these assets from the REIT for at least the next 15 years at $650.0 million annually.

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TUPPERWARE BRANDS CORP. $66 (New York symbol TUP; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 50.4 million; Market cap: $3.3 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.7; Dividend yield: 4.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.tupperwarebrands.com) makes household goods, mainly plastic food and beverage containers, as well as cosmetics and fragrances.

The stock is down 32% from its peak of $97 in December 2013. That’s mainly because the company gets 75% of its sales from outside North America, and the recent rise in the U.S. dollar has hurt the contribution of its overseas operations.

In the quarter ended September 27, 2014, Tupperware’s sales fell 2.4%, to $588.7 million from $603.2 million a year earlier. But if you exclude the negative impact of currency rates, sales rose 4%. Gains in emerging nations like Indonesia and Brazil offset declines in established markets, particularly Germany.

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