investment

Every Wednesday, we publish our “Investor Toolkit” series on TSI Network....

At any age, it’s a good idea to arrange your affairs so that you have someone you trust to take charge of your finances and investments if you can’t handle them yourself. However, it’s best to choose someone you trust thoroughly, and give that person as much latitude as possible. The alternative—leaving fixed instructions—introduces a random element that can only hurt you. After all, it won’t add to your wealth to set up fixed instructions (such as “If I lose the ability to make sound investment decisions, then convert all my holdings into T-bills, and reinvest them as they mature in new T-bills, until my death or recovery”). But these or any fixed instructions may force your representative to make bad choices. This subject came up a while ago with a portfolio management client who is 82 and is now in excellent health. She recognizes that at her age, things can change quickly. So she asked about leaving fixed instructions to automatically convert her portfolio into bonds under certain circumstances....

Partners Real Estate Investment Trust, $7.82, symbol PAR.UN on Toronto (Units outstanding: 25.7 million; Market cap: $200.8 million; www.partnersreit.com), owns 35 retail properties in B.C., Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. In all, these shopping centres contain 2.4 million square feet of leasable space. Partners’ properties include malls and shopping centres that are mostly located in smaller cities, such as London, Ontario, and Selkirk, Manitoba. Its largest tenants include Canadian Tire, Shoppers Drug Mart, Wal-Mart, Sears, Rona, Metro and the Quebec government. The trust completed its purchase of NorRock Realty Finance Corporation in early 2012. NorRock holds a portfolio of mortgage loans and investments connected to Canadian commercial real estate. After it closed the deal, Partners consolidated its units on a 1-for-4 basis....

ISHARES CDN REIT SECTOR INDEX FUND $17.10 (Toronto symbol XRE; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) holds the 15 Canadian real estate investment trusts (REITs) in the S&P/TSX Capped REIT Index. The weight of each REIT is limited to 25% of the ETF’s value.

iShares CDN REIT’s expenses are 0.60% of its assets. The fund yields 4.4%.

The ETF’s largest holding is RioCan REIT at 19.5%, followed by H&R REIT (10.7%), Dundee REIT (8.4%), Canadian REIT (7.2%), Calloway REIT (7.0%), Primaris REIT (6.3%), Cominar REIT (6.2%), Canadian Apartment REIT (6.0%), Boardwalk REIT (5.7%), Allied Properties REIT (5.2%), Chartwell REIT (4.5%), Artis REIT (4.5%), Granite REIT (4.3%), Northern Property REIT (2.6%) and Crombie REIT (1.8%).
...

MCKESSON CORP. (New York symbol MCK; www.mckesson.com) is the largest wholesale drug distributor in the U.S. and Canada. It also owns 49% of Mexico’s largest drug distributor. McKesson’s clients include 40,000 pharmacies, as well as doctor’s offices, hospitals and clinics. It also sells surgical tools and health and beauty products....

RUSSEL METALS (Toronto symbol RUS; www.russelmetals.com) is one of North America’s largest metal distributors. It serves its 39,000 clients through 54 locations in Canada and 12 in the U.S. In the three months ended December 31, 2012, Russel’s revenue rose 7.6%, to $765.9 million from $711.6 million a year earlier....

TECK RESOURCES LTD., $26.27, Toronto symbol TCK.B, reported lower quarterly revenue and earnings this week. That’s mainly because slowing industrial activity in China and elsewhere has hurt prices for its metallurgical coal, which is a key ingredient in steelmaking. Prices of Teck’s other commodities, such as copper and zinc, also declined. In the three months ended March 31, 2013, Teck earned $328 million, or $0.56 a share. These figures exclude unusual items, such as gains and losses on asset sales. On that basis, the latest earnings beat the consensus estimate of $0.41 a share. However, they are down 39.7% from $544 million, or $0.93 a share, a year earlier. Revenue fell 8.5%, to $2.3 billion from $2.5 billion. Even with the decline, the latest figure also beat the consensus estimate of $2.2 billion....

GREAT-WEST LIFECO INC. $27 (Toronto symbol GWO; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 950.6 million; Market cap: $25.7 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.8; Dividend Yield: 4.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.greatwestlifeco.com) is Canada’s secondlargest insurance company after Manulife, with $545.8 billion of assets under administration. It also sells mutual funds and retirement planning and wealth management services. Power Financial Corp. (Toronto symbol PFC) owns 68.2% of Great-West.

Revenue fell 11.9%, from $33.9 billion in 2008 to $29.9 billion in 2011. That’s partly because low interest rates have cut the interest income the company earns on its investment portfolio. However, revenue rose 0.5%, to $30.1 billion, in 2012.


...

RIOCAN REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT TRUST $28 (Toronto symbol REI.UN; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Units outstanding: 300.8 million; Market cap: $8.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 4.9; Dividend yield: 5.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.riocan.com) has teamed up with Allied Properties Real Estate Investment Trust (Toronto symbol AP.UN) and privately held Diamond Corp. to buy a second property in downtown Toronto. In December 2012, the partners acquired a larger, adjacent building. They plan to redevelop these two holdings into a single retail-office complex.

As before, RioCan and Allied will each own 40%, while Diamond will own 20%. RioCan’s share of this latest purchase is $14.9 million. To put that in context, its cash flow was $116 million, or $0.39 a unit, in the fourth quarter of 2012.

RioCan is a buy....

ENBRIDGE INC. $46 (Toronto symbol ENB; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 806.5 million; Market cap: $37.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.4; Dividend yield: 2.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.enbridge.com) has agreed to build a 50-kilometre pipeline that will connect the Hangingstone oil sands project in Alberta to its existing pipeline system. This will be the ninth oil sands project to use this network.

The company will spend $200 million to build this pipeline. That’s equal to 16% of the $1.25 billion, or $1.62 a share, that Enbridge earned in 2012. The new line should begin operating in late 2015. Enbridge also has a 25-year shipping contract with Hangingstone’s developer, which cuts the risk of this investment.

Enbridge is a buy....