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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Our recommendation on a Canadian oil stock that has promising oil sands projects, but as yet no guarantee of success.
A Canadian ETF with U.S. stocks promotes low volatility through beta ratings, but we recommend cost-effective ETFs matching a broad index.
Our view on a Canadian solar stock that has new power plants and long-term contracts but remains dependent on government subsidies.
CONAGRA FOODS INC. $44 (New York symbol CAG; Income Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 427.1 million; Market cap: $18.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.1; Dividend yield: 2.3%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.conagrafoods.com) bought Ralcorp Holdings, the largest private-label food maker in the U.S., for $4.75 billion in January 2013. The purchase has not worked out as well as ConAgra had hoped, as strong competition hurt Ralcorp’s sales and earnings. As a result, the company has had to write down this investment by $2.1 billion. In response, ConAgra has launched a restructuring plan aimed at improving Ralcorp’s profitability. This strategy includes better packaging, speeding up deliveries and launching new products. It has also cut its private-label prices, which should help improve Ralcorp’s market share....
These three companies are trading near their alltime highs. That’s partly because the improving economy is giving their main clients— banks and financial services firms— more to spend on their hard-toreplace services. As well, all three are tapping into the “big data” trend, helping businesses capture and analyze a lot of information about their operations. We like the long-term outlook for all three, but we see only two as buys right now. DUN & BRADSTREET CORP. $128 (New York symbol DNB; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 36.0 million; Market cap: $4.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.8; Dividend yield: 1.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.dnb.com) provides credit reports on over 230 million companies. Its clients use this information to make lending and buying decisions....
An American depositary receipt (ADR) is an investment unit for foreign companies that trade on a U.S. stock market, like Toyota and Honda. These units can represent fractions of shares, whole shares or multiple shares in the foreign firm. ADRs can help you simplify your international investing by letting you buy foreign shares on U.S. exchanges and avoid the complications of buying or selling on a foreign exchange in a foreign currency. ADRs can also help you cut risk, because they must follow some U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and New York Stock Exchange rules. However, Canadian investors need to take extra care. Holding ADRs outside of a registered account, like an RRSP, will expose you to dividend withholding taxes. If you hold ADRs inside an RRSP, the withholding tax depends on whether Canada has a tax treaty with the country where the underlying company is based.
As it improves the performance of a big 2013 acquisition, ConAgra solidifies its position as one of our top stocks to buy in the U.S.
To know how to trade stocks successfully, you need to know the right time to sell stocks. Here’s our advice.
The “new global currency rules” idea is part of a marketing campaign by a promotional newsletter in the U.S. and an array of websites that link to it. The premise is that “on October 20th of this year, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will announce a reserve currency alternative to the U.S. dollar, which will send hundreds of billions of dollars moving around the world, literally overnight.” What in fact might happen is that later this year the IMF may include the Chinese yuan in its official basket of reserve currencies, called special drawing rights (SDRs)....
Urbana Corporation, $2.25, symbol URB.A on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 67.5 million; Market cap: $151.9 million; www.urbanacorp.com), is an investment company with interests across the financial services industry, including banks, broker-dealers and investment managers. Caldwell Financial owns 53.5% of Urbana’s shares. The company’s investments include interests in privately owned entities like the Bombay Stock Exchange and seats on the Minneapolis Grain Exchange and Budapest Stock Exchange. It also holds shares of publicly traded companies like Citigroup, Franco-Nevada, Suncor Energy and Barrick Gold. We see a number of sources of risk with Urbana, including the fact that the company’s private business holdings and complex organizational structure make it difficult to value....