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INDIGO BOOKS & MUSIC INC. $9.12 (Toronto symbol IDG; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 25.2 million; Market cap: $229.8 million; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.2; Dividend yield: 4.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.chapters.indigo.ca) has agreed to sell Kobo Inc., which sells electronic books and reader devices. Indigo owns 51.4% of Kobo. Japanese e-commerce company Ratuken Inc. will pay $315 million U.S. for 100% of Kobo. Indigo will receive $140 million U.S. to $150 million U.S. when the sale closes in early 2012. That’s equal to two-thirds of its market cap. Sales of e-books are growing strongly. Indigo will keep selling Kobo products through its bookstores and web site, however, the Kobo reader is no match for Amazon’s Kindle....

MOSAID TECHNOLOGIES INC., $45.95, symbol MSD on Toronto, has agreed to a friendly, $46.00-a-share, all-cash takeover offer from U.S.-based private-equity firm Sterling Partners. Mosaid mainly licenses computer chip and telecommunications technology, including patents for technology used in smartphones and laptops. The Sterling Partners bid counters last week’s $42-a-share hostile offer from Wi-LAN. Prior to that, Wi-LAN had offered $38 a share....

AMAZON.COM $231.53 (Nasdaq symbol AMZN; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (206-266-1000; www.amazon.com; Shares outstanding: 460.0 million; Market cap: $106.5 billion; No dividends paid) has unveiled new models of its Kindle electronic-book reader, including the Kindle Fire, the company’s first tablet computer. The Kindle Fire features a seven-inch, full colour touch-screen display. It is smaller and has less memory than the top-selling Apple iPad, but it will cost just $199 U.S., compared to $499 U.S. for an iPad. The tablet computer market is fiercely competitive. However, the Kindle Fire’s lower price should help it compete with the iPad and give it an advantage over non-Apple tablets. As well, users will be able to easily buy and download e-books, music, movies and games from Amazon’s web site. The company will also let Kindle Fire users keep their content on its cloud storage service at no extra cost....

POWERSHARES QQQ ETF $53.53 (Nasdaq symbol QQQQ; buy or sell through brokers; www.invescopowershares.com), formerly called Nasdaq 100 Trust Shares, holds the stocks that represent the Nasdaq 100 Index. That index is made up of the 100 largest shares on the Nasdaq exchange, based on market cap. The Nasdaq 100 Index contains shares of companies in a number of major industries, including computer hardware and software, telecommunications, retail/wholesale trade and biotechnology. It does not contain financial companies. The fund’s expenses are about 0.20% of its assets. The index’s highest-weighted stocks are Apple, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Google, Cisco Systems, Intel, Amazon.com, Oracle Corp., Comcast Corp. and Amgen Inc....

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) may have a place in your portfolio. That’s because, 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 get out of them. Instead, they give you a low-cost, flexible, convenient alternative to mutual funds. ETFs trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks. Prices are quoted in newspaper stock tables and online. You’ll have to pay brokerage commissions to buy and sell ETFs. However, ETFs’ low management fees still give them a cost advantage over most conventional mutual funds. As well, shares are only added or removed when the underlying index changes. As a result of this low turnover, you won’t incur the regular capital-gains bills generated by the yearly distributions most conventional mutual funds pay out to unitholders. Below, we update our advice on six ETFs — five buys and one we don’t recommend....

AMAZON.COM INC., $216.23, symbol AMZN on Nasdaq, has unveiled new models of its Kindle electronic-book reader, including the Kindle Fire, the company’s first tablet computer.

The Kindle Fire features a seven-inch, full-colour touch-screen display. It is smaller and has less memory than the top-selling Apple iPad, but it will cost just $199 U.S., compared to $499 U.S. for an iPad.

The Kindle Fire connects to the Internet through Wi-Fi networks, and uses the popular Android operating system developed by Internet search provider Google (Nasdaq symbol GOOG). Amazon will start shipping the Kindle Fire to customers in the U.S. on November 15, 2011.

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The research we do for members of our Inner Circle service turns up many intriguing stories on growth stocks, often in the ultra-competitive high-tech world. Here’s a question about the prospects of Sirius XM Radio (symbol SIRI on Nasdaq) from our latest weekly Inner Circle Q&A, in which I answer questions from our members. Sirius has a big customer base, but it’s not that easy to outdistance the competition. In our search for growth stocks, we look for a strong market position. And if Sirius can hold its current position, it will fit our profile for growth stocks. But that’s not guaranteed. ...

Walgreen Co., $34.90, symbol WAG on New York (Shares outstanding: 922.2 million; Market cap: $31.2 billion; www.walgreens.com), is the largest retail drug chain in the U.S., with over 7,733 outlets across the country. The company’s stores also sell a wide variety of general merchandise. In the three months ended May 31, 2011, Walgreen’s revenue rose 6.8%, to $18.4 billion from $17.2 billion. Earnings per share rose 40.4%, to $0.66 from $0.47, due to the higher revenue and successful cost cuts. Walgreen raised its quarterly dividend by 28.6% with the September 2011 payment. The shares now yield 2.6%. The company has also completed a $1-billion share buyback program over the past year, and plans to buy back another $2 billion of shares over the next year....

Sirius XM Radio, $1.71, symbol SIRI on Nasdaq (Shares outstanding: 6.8 billion; Market cap: $7.0 billion; www.siriusxm.com), broadcasts by satellite about 135 satellite radio stations in North America. Around half are commercial-free music stations. The company offers a wide variety of music channels, including rock, pop, heavy metal, hip-hop, country, dance, jazz, Latin and classical. Sirius also has sports, news, talk, entertainment, traffic and weather channels. Subscription fees supply about 86% of the company’s revenue. Right now, almost all of that revenue comes from car-radio listeners. Sirius also provides music and other programming that users can access through mobile phones and the Internet. Advertising fees supply about 2% of Sirius’ total revenue....

Amazon.com, $213.49, symbol AMZN on Nasdaq (Shares outstanding: 456.0 million; Market cap: $96.4 billion; www.amazon.com), is a world leader in selling books, movies and music online. In addition, the company sells a wide range of other products, such as electronics and toys. It also operates Amazon Marketplace, which lets online sellers market their products on Amazon’s web sites. The company gets 55% of its sales from North America, and 45% from overseas. In the three months ended March 31, 2011, Amazon’s revenue rose 38.2%, to $9.9 billion from $7.1 billion a year earlier. Electronics sales were particularly strong, gaining 59.1%, to $5.6 billion. North American revenue jumped 44.6%, and international revenue rose 31.1%....