Search

AEROPOSTALE INC. $0.04 (symbol AROPQ on the U.S. over-the-counter market; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (646-485-5410; www.aeropostale.com; Shares outstanding: 80.0 million; Market cap: $2.5 million; No dividends paid) has delisted from the New York exchange and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The company has suffered along with many other retailers that focus on the teen market such as Abercrombie & Fitch and American Eagle....

AMERIGO RESOURCES $0.14 (Toronto symbol ARG; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (604-681-2802; www.amerigoresources.com; Shares outstanding: 174.7 million; Market cap: $21.8 million; No dividends paid) processes copper and molybdenum from the waste rock of the El Teniente mine in Chile; that’s the world’s largest copper operation.

In the quarter ended March 31, 2016, Amerigo’s copper production jumped 45.0%, to 12.86 million pounds, at a cost of $1.82 per pound....

BMTC GROUP $12.85 (Toronto symbol GBT.A; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (514-648-5757; No website; Shares outstanding: 37.9 million; Market cap: $483.8 million; Dividend yield: 1.9%) has 38 outlets and is one of Quebec’s biggest retailers of furniture, electronics and appliances....

NISSAN MOTOR (ADR) $18.95 (Nasdaq symbol NSANY; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average) (310-771-3111; www.nissan-global.com; ADRs outstanding 2.2 billion; Market cap: $43.3 billion; Yield: 3.1%) has agreed to buy a 34% stake in Mitsubishi Motors for $2.18 billion U.S....

DEVON ENERGY CORP. $34.12 (New York symbol DVN; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (405-235- 3611; www.dvn.com; Shares outstanding: 523.9 million; Market cap: $18.1 billion; Dividend yield: 0.7%) is one of the largest U.S.-based oil and natural gas explorers and producers....

CIMAREX ENERGY $116.12 (New York symbol XEC; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (303-295-3995; www.cimarex.com; Shares outstanding: 94.8 million; Market cap: $11.0 billion; Dividend yield: 0.3%) produces and explores for natural gas and oil. Gas makes up 64% of the company’s output; the remaining 36% is oil.

The company’s properties are mostly in the Wolfcamp shale area of Texas and New Mexico....

Top-quality high growth dividend stocks can give investors the best of both investment worlds—capital gains and income

Leaving children and loved ones inheritance money is a wonderful gesture. But proper planning needs to be in place for your wealth to transfer smoothly.

Resist the urge to go overboard in Canadian oil stocks—but especially in junior oils, futures or options.

Successful investing in international ETFs has a lot to do with understanding the economies of the countries you invest in.

Formulating a good financial plan forces us to take a good look at the present—and the future.

SUNCOR ENERGY INC. $34 (Toronto symbol SU; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 1.6 billion; Market cap: $54.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.8; Dividend yield: 3.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.suncor.com) is Canada’s largest integrated oil company. Oil production supplies about 40% of Suncor’s overall revenue. The remaining 60% comes from its four oil refineries (three in Canada and one in Colorado) and 1,500 Petro-Canada gas stations. Suncor gets 66% of its crude from its oil sands projects in northern Alberta. It gets a further 16% from the Syncrude oil sands project north of Fort McMurray. In March 2016, the company completed its all-stock acquisition of Canadian Oil Sands Ltd., which owns 36.74% of Syncrude. If you include Canadian Oil Sands’ debt of $2.6 billion, the total price was $7.1 billion. The company has now agreed to buy an additional 5.0% interest in Syncrude from Murphy Oil Corp. (New York symbol MUR). Suncor will pay $937 million when it completes the purchase in the next few weeks. That will raise its stake in Syncrude to 53.74%....

EMERA INC. $47 (Toronto symbol EMA; Income Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 148.2 million; Market cap: $6.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.5; Dividend yield: 4.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.emera .com) owns 100% of Nova Scotia Power, that province’s main electricity supplier. It also owns power utilities in the U.S. and the Caribbean. In September 2015, the company agreed to buy Teco Energy (New York symbol TE). This firm supplies electricity and natural gas to 1.05 million customers in Tampa Bay, Florida. A separate subsidiary distributes gas to 510,000 customers in New Mexico. Emera will pay $10.4 billion U.S., including Teco’s debt. It expects to complete the purchase in mid-2016....

IMPERIAL OIL LTD. $41 (Toronto symbol IMO; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Shares outstanding: 847.6 million; Market cap: $34.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.4; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.imperialoil.ca) is Canada’s second-largest integrated oil producer after Suncor. The company’s Alberta oil sands operations, including its 25% stake in the Syncrude project, supply 90% of its crude. Imperial also has conventional oil and gas operations in Western Canada, and invests in offshore projects in Atlantic Canada. In addition, it owns three refineries and makes petrochemicals. In March 2016, Imperial agreed to sell its 497 company-owned Esso gas stations to independent operators for $2.8 billion....

CENOVUS ENERGY INC. $19 (Toronto symbol CVE; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 833.3 million; Market cap: $15.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1,2; Dividend yield: 1.1%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.cenovus.com) gets 30% of its revenue from its Western Canadian oil sands properties and conventional oil and gas wells. Its biggest properties are its 50%-owned Christina Lake and Foster Creek oil sands projects; ConocoPhilips (New York symbol COP) owns the remaining 50%. Refining supplies 70% 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%....

ENCANA CORP. $8.97 (Toronto symbol ECA; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 849.9 million; Market cap: $7.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.5; Dividend yield: 0.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.encana.com) owns four key properties: Montney (B.C.), Duvernay (Alberta), and Eagle Ford and Permian (both in Texas). In addition to natural gas, these fields produce large amounts of oil and natural gas liquids, such as propane and butane. That cuts the company’s reliance on gas. In the three months ended March 31, 2016, Encana produced an average of 383,400 barrels a day (66% gas, 34% oil and liquids). Due to recent asset sales, that’s down 10.9% from 430,100 barrels a year earlier. The company’s four main properties now supply 70% of its overall production. Low oil prices have forced Encana to write down the value of its properties by $607 million (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars)....

PENGROWTH ENERGY CORP. $2.08 (Toronto symbol PGF; Aggressive Growth and Income Portfolios, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 547.4 million; Market cap: $1.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.4; Dividend suspended in January 2016; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative; www.pengrowth.com) has more than tripled from its low of $0.66 in January 2016. That’s partly because prominent Toronto investor Seymour Schulich recently acquired 16.6% of the company’s shares. The purchase makes him Pengrowth’s largest shareholder. Meanwhile, the company continues to sell less-important properties to focus on its main Lindbergh oil sands project. That’s why its production in the first quarter of 2016 fell 10.5%, to 62,056 barrels a day (61% oil and liquids, 39% natural gas) from 67,934 barrels a year earlier. In addition, weaker oil and gas prices cut its cash flow per share by 4.8%, to $0.20 from $0.21. Pengrowth used the cash from its recent assets sales to pay down its long-term debt. It now stands at $1.7 billion (or 1.5 times its market cap). That’s down 9.3% since the end of 2015....

ENBRIDGE INC. $51 (Toronto symbol ENB; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 928.9 million; Market cap: $47.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.3; Dividend yield: 4.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www. enbridge.com) has asked regulators to extend its permit to build the Northern Gateway pipeline by three years. This $7.9 billion project would pump crude oil from Alberta to the B.C. coast. However, the permit will expire if Enbridge does not begin construction by the end of 2016. The extra time would also help the company address significant political opposition to the project. For example, it will now give Aboriginal groups a 33% stake in the project, up from 10% under the original proposal. Even so, Ottawa’s plan to ban tanker traffic on B.C.’s northern coast hurts the project’s viability. Enbridge is still a hold.

MAPLE LEAF FOODS INC. $30 (Toronto symbol MFI; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 134.6 million; Market cap: $4.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.3; Dividend yield: 1.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.mapleleaffoods.com) is Canada’s largest food processor. It mainly sells its products, including fresh and prepared meats and poultry, under the Maple Leaf and Schneider brands. The company recently completed a multi-year restructuring plan that involved closing older meat processing plants and shifting their operations to newer, more efficient ones. Thanks to the success of this plan, Maple Leaf earned $42.3 million, or $0.31 a share, in the three months ended March 31, 2016. The results are a big improvement over the $2.9 million, or $0.02, it lost a year earlier. If you factor out unusual items, earnings per share jumped to $0.28 from $0.05....

THOMSON REUTERS CORP. $53 (Toronto symbol TRI; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 752.4 million; Market cap: $39.9 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.4; Dividend yield: 3.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.thomsonreuters.com) mainly sells information products to financial clients, such as banks and brokerages. In 2015, this business supplied 52% of Thomson’s revenue. The company also sells specialized information to professionals in the legal (27%); tax and accounting (11%); and intellectual property and science (8%) fields. Its Reuters news division supplies the remaining 2%. Thomson now plans to sell its intellectual property business. It will probably use the expected proceeds of $3 billion to buy back its own shares (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). The sale should close later this year....

TORSTAR CORP. $1.83 (Toronto symbol TS.B; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 80.6 million; Market cap: $147.5 million; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.2; Dividend yield: 14.2%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.torstar.com) recently paid $178 million for 56% of Vertical- Scope, a private firm that operates over 600 online forums and a variety of websites. The company has also launched a digital version of The Toronto Star, its flagship newspaper, for tablet computers. It will take a year or so for these new operations to begin contributing to Torstar’s sales. But they should help reduce its reliance on slower advertising revenue at its newspapers. Meantime, in the first quarter of 2016, Torstar’s losses worsened to $53.5 million, or $0.66 a share, from $459,000, or $0.01, a year earlier. Excluding unusual items, it lost $0.40 a share in the quarter, compared to a profit of $0.02. Revenue fell 9.1%, to $174.8 million from $192.3 million. Job cuts and other restructuring actions should save the company $20.7 million for all of 2016. It remains debt free, and holds cash of $32.5 million, or $0.40 a share. The $0.26-a-share dividend yields a high 14.2%. The company may reduce that payout, but is unlikely to completely eliminate it....

TRANSCANADA CORP. $52 (Toronto symbol TRP; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 702.4 million; Market cap: $36.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.2; Dividend yield: 4.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.transcanada.com) has received the final permits necessary for its $4.8 billion Coastal GasLink pipeline. It would pump natural gas from northeastern B.C. to a proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Kitimat, B.C. From there, tankers would ship the LNG to Asia. The companies behind the LNG plant will make a final decision by the end of 2016. If they proceed, TransCanada will begin building the pipeline and related facilities in early 2017. TransCanada is a buy.

HOME CAPITAL GROUP INC. $32 (Toronto symbol HCG; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 66.0 million; Market cap; $2.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.9; Dividend yield: 3.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.homecapital.com) offers most of its loans through 4,000 independent mortgage brokers. In July 2015, it cut ties with 45 of them after it uncovered inaccurate information on loan applications. Allegedly, these brokers falsified borrowers’ annual incomes but not their credit scores and property values. The company has now reviewed 75% of these loans. So far, it has not found any unusual problems. It expects to complete the process by the end of 2016. Home Capital also cuts its credit losses down by identifying problem loans early and adjusting the repayment terms. In the first quarter of 2016, it set aside $1.4 million to cover potential loan losses, down 42.0% from a year earlier....

BANK OF NOVA SCOTIA $63 (Toronto symbol BNS; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.2 billion; Market cap: $75.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.4; Dividend yield: 4.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.scotiabank.com) continues to expand its Internet and mobile banking operations. As a result, it is reorganizing its branches and cutting jobs. Severance payments and other costs will reduce the bank’s earnings by $0.22 a share in the quarter ended April 30, 2016. To put that in context, it earned $1.43 a share in the previous quarter. Bank of Nova Scotia is a buy.

RESTAURANT BRANDS INTERNATIONAL INC. $53 (Toronto symbol QSR; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 429.3 million; Market cap: $22.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.1; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.rbi.com) operates 4,438 Tim Hortons coffee and donut locations and 15,008 Burger King outlets in 100 countries. If you exclude restructuring costs and other unusual items, Restaurant Brands earned $142.1 million in the three months ended March 31, 2016 (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). That’s up 92.3% from $73.9 million a year earlier. Due to more shares outstanding, earnings per share rose 87.5%, to $0.30 from $0.16. The higher profits came mainly from lower costs and the introduction of more high-profit menu items. Sales fell 1.6%, to $918.5 million from $933.3 million. However, if you exclude the negative impact of the U.S. dollar on Restaurant Brands’ overseas operations, sales in the quarter gained 6.0%....