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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AIMIA INC. (Toronto symbol AIM; www.aimia.com) owns and operates Aeroplan, Canada’s largest loyalty program. It also owns Nectar, the U.K.’s biggest loyalty program. In addition, Aimia has interests in Air Miles Middle East and Nectar Italia, as well as Club Premier, the leading loyalty program in Mexico....
Every Wednesday, we publish our “Investor Toolkit” series. Whether you’re a new or experienced investor, these weekly updates are designed to give you specific advice on investing in the stock market and other investment topics. Each Investor Toolkit update gives you a fundamental piece of our investment strategy, and shows you how you can put it into practice right away. Tip of the week: “You should start investing with a handful of good stocks and add to them steadily, being careful never to dilute your potential gains with too few, or too many, stocks.”...
More and more, I find that I cringe a little every time an investor tells me that they recognize their current investment approach is not appropriate, but they are not yet ready to switch. With a little probing, these investors usually go on to explain that they have lost too much money with the current approach, and they “can’t afford” to sell out at current prices and convert that paper loss into a real one. Instead, they plan to stick with the current approach for an indefinite period. Sometimes they want to hold on to their current portfolio until they get back to break-even. Others say they’ll be satisfied if the current loss shrinks by, say, half. I recall one time in summer 2000. A friend asked me to have a short chat with a female relative who had just gone through a divorce and had received “a very generous settlement”. He said he didn’t know the details but the lady wanted an outside opinion on what to do with her money....
GENERAL ELECTRIC CO. (New York symbol GE; www.ge.com) continues to shrink its GE Capital subsidiary, which provides loans and other financial services to buyers of its industrial products, such as power-transmission gear, jet engines and locomotives....
ALGONQUIN POWER & UTILITIES CORP. (Toronto symbol AQN; www.algonquinpower.com) has nearly tripled in size over the last year through a series of acquisitions....
DUN & BRADSTREET CORP., $111.45, New York symbol DNB, provides credit reports on over 230 million companies. Its clients use this information to make lending and buying decisions. In the three months ended September 30, 2013, Dun & Bradstreet’s earnings fell 8.5%, to $72.8 million from $79.6 million a year earlier. The company spent $55.0 million on share buybacks in the quarter. Due to fewer shares outstanding, earnings per share rose 6.3%, to $1.87 from $1.76. The lower overall earnings are partly because the company continues to invest in new products and improve the quality of its data. It has also discontinued less profitable products and closed unneeded facilities, which resulted in one-time severance payments and other costs....
DUNDEE REIT, $28.25, symbol D.UN on Toronto, owns and manages 24.3 million square feet of office and retail space. The real estate investment trust has a 94.9% occupancy rate. As the Canadian economy improves, the trend in interest rates is likely to be upward. That rise—or the anticipation of an increase—can push down prices of REITs and high-yielding stocks, such as utilities. That’s largely why a number of REITs, including Dundee, have moved down lately. When interest rates rise, REITs may suffer because they have a lot of mortgage debt, and it’s more expensive to raise money and refinance existing loans. As well, their units, which typically offer high yields, compete with fixed-income instruments for investor interest....
Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle for specific advice on stocks as well as questions on investment strategy and the economy. Every week, his comments and recommendations on the most intriguing questions of the past week go out to all Inner Circle members. And each week, we offer you one of the highlights from these Q&A sessions. While we reserve our buy-hold-sell advice for Inner Circle members, these excerpts provide a great deal of information and analysis on stocks we’ve covered for members of Pat’s Inner Circle....
A year ago, we advised you to resist the lure of the investment marketers who focus on hyperinflation risk to market their overpriced gold coins, gems and other collectibles. Since then, the price of gold has dropped by a third. The U.S. federal spending deficit has begun to move down. The most economically troubled countries of Europe have made some fiscal progress. But the hyperinflation marketers ignore these gains. Their advertising is as shrill and misleading as ever. The U.S. and other countries are still running vast federal budget deficits, of course. This hurts the broad economy, and will eventually spur inflation. However, hyperinflation has always been an extremely rare phenomenon, quite different from today’s mild inflation. The term refers to inflation that becomes so intense that money soon loses all value. The hyperinflation industry has been around at least since the high-inflation days of the 1970s and 1980s. Back then, hyperinflation marketers used to try to put on a scholarly air. Now, many seem to model themselves on late-night TV pitchmen....