investment

p>CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY LTD.$108 (Toronto symbol CP) was our top pick for 2012 at $69. Since then, the stock has gained 56.5%. We’ve long admired CP, but bad weather and poor efficiency have held back its earnings and stock price in the past few years.

It seems activist investment firm Pershing Square shared our view, and in 2011 it became CP’s largest shareholder(it now holds 14.2%). We felt Pershing would push management to improve efficiency, and help unlock more of CP’s value. That’s partly why we made CP our #1 buy for 2012.

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Pat McKeough responds to many personal questions about specific stocks and other investment topics from the members of his Inner Circle. 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.

This week, an Inner Circle member asked about the wisdom of taking profits on a high-yielding stock whose shares have had a big run-up in price. Pat assesses the prospects of this gas station operator which has done an astute job of franchising its stations but also pursues a growth-by-acquisition that adds risk in a competitive industry.

Q: Hello again Pat: I bought Parkland Fuel Corp. about 18 months ago and have enjoyed the wonderful yield and am up 60% on the stock value. I am tempted to realize my capital gain. What are your thoughts on this stock?

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ARCHER DANIELS MIDLAND CO. $29 (New York symbol ADM; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 658.6 million; Market cap: $19.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.2; Dividend yield: 2.4%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.adm.com) processes corn, wheat, soybeans, canola, flax seed, peanuts, cocoa and other crops into a variety of food ingredients, such as flour, oils and sweeteners....

Every Wednesday, we publish our “Investor Toolkit” series on TSI Network. Whether you’re a beginning or experienced investor, these weekly updates are designed to give you specific investment advice, including the best use of financial ratios in your stock market research. Each Investor Toolkit update gives you a fundamental piece of investing strategy, and shows you how you can put it into practice right away. Today’s tip: “When you’re trying to assess whether a company can manage its debt, the most popular ratio may actually be misleading.”...

Most investor sayings and clichés have at least a hint of truth. But they can still lead you to make good or bad investment decisions, depending on how you apply them. For instance, you’ll sometimes hear investors say that you shouldn’t fall in love with your stocks. This seems to make sense. You should keep an open mind on your investments, rather than falling in love with them and holding them forever, despite any adverse changes in their business or the field in which they operate. However, investors sometimes use this tidbit of advice as a justification for selling a stock that has shot up unexpectedly. It’s easy to jump to the conclusion that unexpected strength in a stock won’t last. Friends, brokers and cable-TV commentators may advise you to “take some money off the table” —that is, sell all or part of your market-beating stock pick. They may justify this advice by informing you that “you never go broke taking a profit”, and that you can always “buy it back on a dip”....

A: Vanguard Global ex-U.S. Real Estate ETF, $55.65, symbol VNQI on Nasdaq (Units outstanding: 7.8 million; Market cap: $436.6 million; www.vanguard.com), invests in the 460 stocks in the S&P Global ex-U.S. Property Index. This index represents real estate investment trusts (REITs) in more than 30 countries outside the U.S.

Vanguard Global ex-U.S....

A month ago, we examined one of the energy stocks we cover in our newsletter for aggressive investing, Stock Pickers Digest. Zargon Oil and Gas (Toronto symbol ZAR) has trimmed its commitment to natural gas due to the slump in prices (view the article here). Today, in the wake of a recent rally in oil prices, we look at the prospects for a tech stock that serves the oil and gas drilling industry.
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Pat McKeough responds to many personal questions about buying stocks and other investment topics from the members of his Inner Circle. 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.

This week, an Inner Circle member asked about Empire Company, a stock that makes money from a variety of sources, including movie theatres. But its chief source of revenue is grocery chain Sobeys. Pat considers the reliable income generated by Sobeys’ stores against the threat of increased competition as more big-box retailers crowd into the grocery business.

Q: Hi: I have recently taken a small position in Empire Company. What do you think of their shares? Thank you.

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BROADRIDGE FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS $22.97 (New York symbol BR: TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (201-714-3000; www.broadridge.com; Shares outstanding: 122.2 million; Market cap: $2.8 billion; Dividend yield: 3.1%) serves the investment industry in three main areas: investor communications; securities processing; and transaction clearing....

Investors who are still years away from retirement are often plagued by a nagging fear. When they stop working, there won’t be enough income coming in.

This underlines the fact that successful retirement planning begins well before you approach retirement age. There is one plan that we have found is more effective than any other in preparing a secure retirement. It begins during your working years.

The best retirement plan you can have is to start saving as early in your working career as possible. You then invest a steady or rising amount of that money in the stock market every year. When you follow this plan, you automatically profit from dollar-cost averaging. You will automatically buy more shares when prices are low, and fewer shares when prices are high

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