investment
An investment is an asset or property acquired to generate income or gain appreciation. Appreciation is the increase in the value of an asset over time. It requires the outlay of a resource today, like time, effort, and money, for a greater payoff in the future or for generating a profit.
An investment involves using capital in the present to increase an asset’s value over time.
Investments may include bonds, stocks, real estate, or alternative investments.
Investments can be diversified to reduce risk, though this may reduce the amount of earning potential.
In business contexts, investments are financial; however, consider how some people spend time to make higher incomes in the future (i.e. invest in a college education).
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Simplifying operations and boosting its balance sheet under new capital rules, JP Morgan Chase remains one of our top U.S. dividend stocks.
BROADRIDGE FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS INC. $52 (New York symbol BR; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 118.2 million; Market cap: $6.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.2; Dividend yield: 2.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.broadridge.com) serves the investment industry in three main areas: investor communications, securities processing and transaction clearing.
Without one-time items, the company earned $171.5 million in its fiscal 2015 fourth quarter, which ended June 30, 2015. That’s up 18.6% from $144.6 million a year earlier. Earnings per share rose 20.7%, to $1.40 from $1.16, on fewer shares outstanding.
Revenue gained 4.9%, to $929.6 million from $885.9 million. Broadridge continues to add new clients and is doing a good job of holding on to existing ones. Recurring fee revenue rose 7% in the latest quarter and accounted for 65% of the total.
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Without one-time items, the company earned $171.5 million in its fiscal 2015 fourth quarter, which ended June 30, 2015. That’s up 18.6% from $144.6 million a year earlier. Earnings per share rose 20.7%, to $1.40 from $1.16, on fewer shares outstanding.
Revenue gained 4.9%, to $929.6 million from $885.9 million. Broadridge continues to add new clients and is doing a good job of holding on to existing ones. Recurring fee revenue rose 7% in the latest quarter and accounted for 65% of the total.
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MONDELEZ INTERNATIONAL INC. $42 (Nasdaq symbol MDLZ; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 1.6 billion; Market cap: $67.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.0; Dividend yield: 1.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.mondelezinternational.com) makes cookies and biscuits (Oreo, Chips Ahoy, Ritz), chocolate bars (Cadbury, Toblerone), gum and candy (Trident, Chiclets) and Halls cough drops.
The stock gained 10% recently on news that activist investment firm Pershing Square Capital now owns 7.5% of the company. Pershing will likely pressure Mondelez to improve its profitability, instead of trying to break it up or merge it with another food maker. However, the stock is expensive at 23.6 times the company’s projected 2015 earnings of $1.78 a share.
Mondelez is a hold.
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The stock gained 10% recently on news that activist investment firm Pershing Square Capital now owns 7.5% of the company. Pershing will likely pressure Mondelez to improve its profitability, instead of trying to break it up or merge it with another food maker. However, the stock is expensive at 23.6 times the company’s projected 2015 earnings of $1.78 a share.
Mondelez is a hold.
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BCE INC., $54.14, Toronto symbol BCE, continues to see strong demand for its wireless, high-speed Internet and Fibe TV services. In the three months ended June 30, 2015, the company’s earnings rose 14.8%, to $735 million from $640 million a year earlier. Per-share profits gained just 6.1%, to $0.87 from $0.82, on more shares outstanding. These figures exclude unusual items, such as costs to integrate BCE’s November 2014 purchase of the 56% of Bell Aliant it didn’t already own. On that basis, the latest earnings matched the consensus estimate....
Pennsylvania-based Vanguard Group is one of the world’s largest investment management companies. In all, it administers almost $3 trillion U.S. in 170 mutual funds. Vanguard, which went into business in 1975, offers low-fee index mutual funds. Generally speaking, Canadians can’t buy units of mutual funds that are registered in the U.S., because they aren’t registered with provincial securities commissions. For that matter, some Canadian funds aren’t available in all provinces. Canadians can, however, buy Vanguard exchange traded funds (ETFs) that trade on stock exchanges. We don’t recommend all of Vanguard’s ETFs, but here are two we do see as low-fee buys....
CANADIAN REIT $41.55 (Toronto symbol REF.UN; Units outstanding: 72.8 million; Market cap: $3.1 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 4.3%; www.creit.ca) owns 198 properties, including retail, industrial and office buildings, across Canada and in Chicago. These holdings contain 24.9 million square feet of leasable area. The trust’s occupancy rate is 94.7%. In the three months ended June 30, 2015, Canadian REIT’s revenue rose 5.5%, to $111.5 million from $105.7 million a year earlier. Cash flow per unit gained 2.7%, to $0.76 from $0.74. Canadian REIT generally aims to grow by developing its own properties rather than through large acquisitions. Over the next few years, it’s spending $660 million to add about 3.1 million square feet of space. To cut its risk, the trust takes on partners to help it carry out big projects....
ISHARES CDN REIT SECTOR INDEX FUND $15.79 (Toronto symbol XRE; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) holds the 15 Canadian real estate investment trusts in the S&P/TSX Capped REIT Index. iShares CDN REIT’s expenses are 0.60% of its assets. The fund yields 5.1%. The ETF’s largest holding is RioCan REIT at 20.1%, followed by H&R REIT (14.6%), Smart REIT (7.9%), Canadian Apartment Properties REIT (7.9%), Canadian REIT (7.3%), Allied Properties REIT (6.7%), Cominar REIT (6.5%), Dream Office REIT (6.1%), Boardwalk REIT (5.3%), Granite REIT (4.5%), Artis REIT (4.3%), Dream Global REIT (2.5%), Crombie REIT (2.3%), Pure Industrial REIT (2.1%) and Northern Property REIT (1.6%)....
TD BANK $52.25 (Toronto symbol TD; Shares outstanding: 1.8 billion; Market cap: $97.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.8%; www.td.com) owns 41.01% of TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. (Nasdaq symbol AMTD), one of the largest online brokerage firms in the U.S. TD has announced that Ameritrade would contribute $92 million (Canadian) to its earnings in its 2015 third quarter, which ends July 31, 2015, up 21.1% from $76 million a year earlier. To put these figures in perspective, TD earned $2.2 billion, or $1.14 a share, in its fiscal second quarter, which ended April 30, 2015. Ameritrade’s average daily trading volumes rose 8.0% in the second quarter, mainly due to an increase in derivatives trading....
Takeovers help Genuine Parts sustain growth—and dividend hikes—in a cyclical field. Our take on how lower gasoline prices help its outlook.
VeriFone Systems Inc., $32.58, symbol PAY on New York (Shares outstanding: 114.3 million; Market cap: $3.7 billion; www.verifone.com), designs and sells point-of-sale terminals and software for security and encryption. These systems process various payment types, including signature and PIN-based debit cards, credit cards and contactless payment systems. The company started up in 1981. It first sold shares to the public on May 4, 2005, for $10.00 each. VeriFone’s customers include banks, retailers and government agencies. It gets 65% of its revenue by selling hardware; the remaining 35% comes from software support, installation, maintenance and related services....