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ADOBE SYSTEMS $32.46 (Nasdaq symbol ADBE; TSINetwork Rating: Average) (408-536-6000; www.adobe.com; Shares outstanding: 493.8 million; Market cap: $16.0 billion; No dividends paid) makes software that lets computer users create, edit and share documents in the popular PDF format. As well, graphic designers use its software to create print publications and web pages.

The company also makes Adobe Flash, which lets website developers make their pages more interactive by adding animation and video.

Adobe recently stopped making Flash for smartphones and other mobile devices. Instead, it will focus on developing products that are based on the newer HTML5 Internet standard.

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Even though we recommend mostly aggressive stocks in Stock Pickers Digest, we still manage to pick a large number that get taken over at high profits for our readers.

Mosaid Inc. was our second-most-recent winner, with a $46-ashare offer from Sterling Partners. That gave us a 107.2% gain in the 18 months from our first recommendation in May 2010.

Our latest pick to attract a takeover at a high profit to our subscribers is RuggedCom $33, symbol RCM on Toronto.

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VITERRA INC. $10.09 (Toronto symbol VT; TSINetwork Rating: Average) (1-866-569-4411; www.viterra.ca; Shares outstanding: 371.7 million; Market cap: $3.8 billion; Dividend yield: 1.5%) is a Saskatchewan-based agribusiness that mainly operates in Canada and Australia. The company accumulates, stores, transports, processes and markets grains, oilseeds and specialty crops including lentils and mustard.

Saskatchewan Wheat Pool was a farmers co-operative until it became a public company in 1996. It changed its name to Viterra in 2007 after it bought Agricore United for $1.3 billion. In 2009, Viterra bought Australian grain handler ABB Grain for $1.4 billion.

In its 2011 fiscal year, which ended October 31, 2011, Viterra’s revenue jumped 42.8%, to $11.8 billion from $8.2 billion. Earnings per share rose 82.1%, to $0.71 from $0.39. Higher crop shipments and grain prices were the main reasons for the gains.

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Every Wednesday, we publish our “Investor Toolkit” series on TSI Network. Whether you’re a new or experienced investor, these weekly updates are designed to give you specific advice on successful investing. Each Investor Toolkit update gives you a fundamental tip and shows you how you can put it into practice right away. Tip of the week: “Short sellers can make money in a hurry, but there are more losers than winners.”...

You may find that exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have a place in your portfolio. Unlike many other financial innovations, they don’t load you up with heavy management fees or tie you down with high redemption charges if you decide to withdraw. Instead, they give you a low-cost, flexible, convenient alternative to mutual funds. They have another advantage. Since shares are only added or removed when the underlying index changes, there’s a low turnover. That means you aren’t faced with the capital gains bills generated by the yearly distributions most mutual funds pay out to their unitholders....

One of the questions we get asked most often is how we’ve managed to recommend so many stocks over the years that get taken over. Almost invariably, we come back to one key point. We aim to recommend stocks with hidden assets—assets that attract less investor attention than they deserve....

Question: I would like your opinion on Africa Oil and Cabo Drilling. As always, your pearls of wisdom are very insightful and greatly appreciated.

Our investing strategy is a conservative one. We consistently recommend taking the long, rather than the short, view. But clearly not all stocks can be held indefinitely. A good portfolio is never a completely static one. Bringing in good stocks will obviously invigorate your portfolio. It is equally true that some stocks that fail to perform just aren’t worth holding on to. That leads many investors to ask us just when they should let go of a weak stock and replace it with something new....

Buy a house that suits your needs, and let the potential real estate investment profits take care of themselves. As real estate investments, homes

Tech stocks continue to make headlines. Often, this is due to the competitive race to get new products on the market. Sometimes, it is due to the spectacular rise—or spectacular fall—of a tech stock’s share price. But successful investors look beyond the headlines, to a company’s measurable strengths and weaknesses, to judge its long-term prospects, as we do today with one of the best-known names in the industry. GOOGLE INC. (Nasdaq symbol GOOG; investor.google.com) is the world’s leading Internet search engine. The search service is free, but it provides a platform for Google to sell ads on its websites. Ads account for 96% of its total revenue....

Investing is not an exact science. That’s why experience and judgment are just as essential as fundamental analysis in successful investing. That’s also why a balanced temperament is so important. It can keep you on a steady course and help you avoid losses....

ENCANA CORP. $19.59 (Toronto symbol ECA; Shares outstanding: 737.6 million; Market cap: $14.4 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 4.1%; www.encana.com) is selling two plants in the Cutbank Ridge area of northeastern B.C. to VERESEN $15.31 (Toronto symbol VSN; Shares outstanding: 169.8 million; Market cap: $2.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 6.5%). Veresen owns and operates energy pipelines and processing plants across North America.

These plants process natural gas from nearby wells. The sale also includes 370 kilometres of pipelines. Veresen will pay Encana $920 million (Canadian) when the deal closes in early 2012.

Including this deal, Encana sold or agreed to sell $3.5 billion U.S. of non-essential assets in 2011. The sales are part of its plan to focus on its main gas-producing properties in Alberta, B.C., Wyoming, Michigan, Colorado and Louisiana.

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VANGUARD GROWTH ETF $62.76 (New York symbol VUG; buy or sell through brokers) aims to track the MSCI U.S. Prime Market Growth Index, a broadly diversified index that mainly consists of stocks of large U.S. companies. Its MER is just 0.12%.

The $20.8-billion fund’s top holdings are Apple Inc., IBM, Google, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Philip Morris International, Oracle Corp., Schlumberger, Wal-Mart and Cisco Systems

Vanguard Growth ETF is broken down by economic segment as follows: Information Technology (30.1%), Consumer Discretionary (17.0%), Industrials (12.6%), Consumer Staples (12.1%), Energy (9.4%), Health Care (9.3%), Financials (4.6%), Materials (3.4%), Telecommunication Services (0.8%) and Utilities (0.2%).

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VANGUARD EMERGING MARKETS ETF $39.22 (New York symbol VWO; buy or sell through brokers) aims to track the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, which is made up of common stocks of companies located in emerging markets around the world. The fund has an MER of 0.22%.

The fund’s top holdings are Samsung Electronics (South Korea: electronics), Petroleo Brasileiro SA (Brazil: oil and gas), Vale SA (Brazil: mining), Gazprom (Russia: gas utility), China Mobile (China: wireless), Taiwan Semiconductor (Taiwan: computer chips), America Movil SAB de CV (Latin America: wireless), China Construction Bank (China: banking), Itau Unibanco Holding SA (Brazil: banking), and Industrial & Commercial Bank of China (China: banking), CNOOC Ltd. (China: oil and gas) and MTN Group (South Africa: telecommunications).

The $56.3-billion Vanguard Emerging Markets ETF’s breakdown by country is as follows: China (17.1%), Brazil (15.4%), South Korea (14.9%), Taiwan (10.9%), South Africa (7.5%), India (7.4%), Russia (6.6%), Mexico (4.7%), Malaysia (3.4%), Indonesia (2.9%), Thailand (1.8%), Chile (1.7%), Poland (1.5%), Turkey (1.3%) and Other (0.9%).

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IBM $186 (New York symbol IBM; Shares outstanding: 1.2 billion; Market cap: $223.2 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 1.6%) continues to expand its software business.

In early December 2011, the company agreed to buy DemandTec Inc. (Nasdaq symbol DMAN), which makes software that retailers and consumer products makers use to analyze their customers’ spending habits. This information helps them predict consumer behaviour and quickly adjust their prices.

Adding DemandTec will also enhance IBM’s expertise in cloud computing. That’s where data and software are kept on central servers. Users then access this information over the Internet through a variety of devices

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H&R REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $23.16 (Toronto symbol HR.UN; Units outstanding: 157.3 million; Market cap: $3.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 4.8%; www.hr-reit.com) owns stakes in 39 office buildings, 117 industrial properties and 133 retail properties across Canada. H&R has a 98.9% occupancy rate.

In the three months ended September 30, 2011, the REIT’s revenue rose 11.0%, to $169.6 million from $152.8 million a year earlier. Cash flow per unit rose 5.7%, to $0.37 from $0.35.

H&R is nearly finished building The Bow, a $1.33-billion, two-million-square-foot office building in Calgary. Encana Corp. has already leased the entire building for 25 years.

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CANADIAN REIT $36.18 (Toronto symbol REF.UN; Units outstanding: 67.3 million; Market cap: $2.4 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 4.0%; www.creit.ca) owns over 160 properties, including retail, industrial and office buildings, located across Canada and in the Chicago area. These properties contain over 24 million square feet of leasable area. Its occupancy rate is 93.7%.

In the three months ended September 30, 2011, the real estate investment trust’s revenue rose 5.5%, to $83.7 million from $79.4 million a year earlier. Cash flow per unit rose 5.3%, to $0.60 from $0.57.

Canadian REIT bought $264.5 million of properties in 2011, including its June 2011 purchase of two fully leased malls in Mississauga, Ontario, for $174.4 million. Tenants include Future Shop, Famous Players, Chapters, Rona and National Sports.

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RIOCAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $26.33 (Toronto symbol REI.UN; Units outstanding: 267.0 million; Market cap: $7.0 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 5.2%; www.riocan.com) has purchased 80% of the Alamo Ranch shopping mall in San Antonio, Texas. Inland Western Retail REIT owns the remaining 20%.

This is RioCan’s first acquisition in San Antonio. The mall is 88% occupied, and has well-known anchor tenants, such as Target, J.C. Penny and Lowes. Other tenants include Best Buy and Dick’s Sporting Goods. These factors cut the risk of expanding into unfamiliar markets.

RioCan is a buy.

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MANITOBA TELECOM SERVICES INC. $29.80 (Toronto symbol MBT; Shares outstanding: 65.7 million; Market cap: $2.0 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 5.7%; www.mts.ca) has over 1.3 million telephone and wireless customers in Manitoba. This business now accounts for 54% of the company’s revenue.

The remaining 46% comes from its Allstream division, which provides integrated telephone, Internet and other communication services to businesses across Canada.

In the three months ended September 30, 2011, Manitoba Tel’s revenue fell 1.7%, to $443.2 million from $451.0 million a year earlier. The MTS division’s revenue rose 0.7%. Allstream’s revenue fell 4.6%, mostly because it is closing less-profitable businesses. Earnings per share fell 8.2%, to $0.56 from $0.61. The stock yields a high 5.7%.

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BELL ALIANT INC. $28.65 (Toronto symbol BA: Shares outstanding: 227.8 million; Market cap: $6.5 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Yield: 6.6%; www.aliant.ca) sells telephone and Internet services to 2.8 million customers in Atlantic Canada, as well as rural parts of Ontario and Quebec. The company also sells wireless services through an alliance with BCE, which owns 43.8% of Bell Aliant.

The company faces strong competition from cable providers. In addition, many of its phone customers are switching to wireless devices. However, Bell Aliant’s wireless agreement with BCE and recent upgrades to its high-speed Internet network are helping it hold on to clients and attract new ones.

Bell Aliant earned $0.75 a share in the three months ended September 30, 2011. A year earlier, it earned just $0.21 a share.

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ISHARES MSCI SOUTH KOREA INDEX FUND $54.02 (New York Exchange symbol EWY; buy or sell through brokers), is an exchange-traded fund that aims to track the MSCI Korea Index.

The fund’s top holdings include Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor Co., Posco (steel), Hyundai Mobis (auto parts), Shinhan Financial, Kia Motors, LG Chemical, KB Financial, Hyundai Heavy Industries and Hynix Semiconductor.

The South Korean stock market has seen little change since the death of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il on December 17, 2011, and the elevation of his son Kim Jong-un as leader.

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ISHARES MSCI EMERGING MARKETS EASTERN EUROPE INDEX FUND $24.23 (New York Exchange symbol ESR; buy or sell through brokers), is an ETF that aims to track the MSCI Emerging Markets Eastern Europe Index. The fund’s geographic breakdown is as follows: Russia, 74.0%; Poland, 17.4%; Czech Republic, 4.3%; and Hungary, 3.5%.

The fund’s top holdings are Gazprom (Russia: gas utility), 21.0%; Lukoil (Russia: oil), 10.0%; Sberbank (Russia: bank), 7.9%; Novatek (Russia: natural gas), 4.2%; Rosneft Oil Company (Russia: oil and gas), 3.9%; Uralkali (Russia: potash), 3.7%; Mobile Tele-Systems (Russia: wireless), 2.8%; MMC Norilsk Nickel (Russia: mining), 2.7%; Tafneft (Russia: oil and gas); and CEZ AS (Czech Republic: utility), 2.2%. iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Eastern Europe Index Fund’s expense ratio is 0.68%.

The fund’s concentration in Russia adds risk, especially given its current political tensions. But the long-term outlook for resource prices, including oil and gas, is positive. That’s a big plus for Russia’s largely resource-based economy, which is forecast to grow by 3.5% in 2012.

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ISHARES S&P INDIA NIFTY 50 INDEX FUND $20.44 (Nasdaq symbol INDY; buy or sell through brokers; us.ishares.com) is an ETF that aims to track the S&P CNX Nifty Index, which represents the 50 largest, most liquid Indian securities.

The fund’s top holdings are Infosys Technologies (software), 9.5%; Reliance Industries Ltd. (conglomerate), 8.4%; ITC Ltd. (conglomerate), 7.7%; Housing Development Finance, 6.3%; ICICI Bank, 5.7%; HDFC Bank, 5.6%; Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (information technology), 4.2%; Larsen & Toubro Ltd. (conglomerate), 3.9%; Hindustan Unilever Ltd. (consumer products), 3.1%; and State Bank of India, 3.0%.

The fund’s industry breakdown includes: Banks, 17.0%; Computers, 15.9%; Refineries, 8.8%; Cigarettes, 7.7%; Finance: Housing, 6.3%; Automobiles, 5.4%; Pharmaceuticals, 4.5%; Power, 4.3%; Engineering, 3.9%; and Oil Exploration, 3.3%. The fund has an expense ratio of 0.89%.

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CENOVUS ENERGY $34.33 (Toronto symbol CVE; Shares outstanding: 757.8 million; Market cap: $26.0 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 2.3%; www.cenovus.com) reported that its cash flow per share rose 54.4% in the third quarter of 2011, to $1.05 from $0.68 a year earlier. A 9.6% increase in oil prices was the main reason for the gain.

Cenovus continues to expand its Foster Creek and Christina Lake oil sands operations in Alberta. U.S.-based ConocoPhillips owns 50% of these properties. The company now plans to spend between $3.1 billion and $3.4 billion on these and other projects in 2012. That’s up 23% from its 2011 capital expenditures.

These investments will push up Cenovus’s production to between 155,000 and 171,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (including natural gas), from 135,000 barrels in 2011.

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PENGROWTH ENERGY CORP. $11.31 (Toronto symbol PGF; Shares outstanding: 329.3 million; Market cap: $3.7 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 7.4%; www.pengrowth.com) produces oil and natural gas from properties in Alberta, B.C. and Saskatchewan. It also owns 8.4% of the Sable Offshore Energy Project, which extracts natural gas from several fields south of Nova Scotia.

Pengrowth produced an average of 74,568 barrels of oil equivalent per day (including natural gas) in the three months ended September 30, 2011. That’s up 2.6% from 72,704 barrels a year earlier. Production was weighted 51% to oil and 49% to natural gas.

Cash flow rose 0.7%, to $150.4 million from $149.3 million. Cash flow per share fell 8.0%, to $0.46 from $0.50, on more shares outstanding.

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