monthly dividend

WAJAX CORP. $49 (Toronto symbol WJX; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (905-212-3300; www.wajax.ca; Shares outstanding:16.6 million; Market cap: $813.4 million; Dividend yield: 6.6%) sells and services heavy equipment, including cranes and forklifts. It also sells related parts (such as bearings, motors, hoses and fittings) and power systems (including diesel engines and transmissions). Wajax operates through 117 dealerships across Canada. Its customers are in the natural resource, construction, manufacturing, industrial processing and transportation industries. In the three months ended December 31, 2011, Wajax’s revenue rose 19.2%, to $377.2 million from $316.4 million a year earlier. Demand remained strong across all of the company’s markets....

WAJAX CORP. $49 (Toronto symbol WJX; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk) (905-212-3300; www.wajax.ca; Shares outstanding:16.6 million; Market cap: $813.4 million; Dividend yield: 6.6%) sells and services heavy equipment, including cranes and forklifts. It also sells related parts (such as bearings, motors, hoses and fittings) and power systems (including diesel engines and transmissions).

Wajax operates through 117 dealerships across Canada. Its customers are in the natural resource, construction, manufacturing, industrial processing and transportation industries.

In the three months ended December 31, 2011, Wajax’s revenue rose 19.2%, to $377.2 million from $316.4 million a year earlier. Demand remained strong across all of the company’s markets.

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ZARGON OIL & GAS $14.04 (Toronto symbol ZAR; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (403-264-9992; www.zargon.ca; Shares outstanding: 29.4 million; Market cap: $412.8 million; Dividend yield: 8.6%) produces natural gas and oil in Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and North Dakota. The company’s production is 61% oil and 39% natural gas. In the three months ended December 31, 2011, Zargon produced 9,278 barrels of oil equivalent per day. That’s down slightly from 9.317 barrels a year earlier. However, that was mainly because the company sold some less important properties. Higher oil prices pushed up Zargon’s cash flow per share by 7.4%, to $0.58 from $0.54 a year earlier. The company continues to successfully drill horizontal wells in the Alberta Plains North area. Horizontal drilling involves drilling development wells sideways or at an angle to reach isolated pockets of gas or to follow a reservoir spread out in a narrow layer. This method works well in places where conventional drilling is impossible or too expensive....

TRILOGY ENERGY CORP. $27.33 (Toronto symbol TET; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (403-290-2900; www.trilogy.com; Shares outstanding: 90.5 million; Market cap: $2.5 billion; Dividend yield: 1.5%) owns oil and gas properties in the Kaybob and Grande Prairie areas of central Alberta. About 64% of Trilogy’s production is natural gas. The remaining 36% is oil.

In the three months ended December 31, 2011, Trilogy produced 28,288 barrels of oil equivalent per day (including natural gas), up 31.3% from 21,544 barrels a year earlier. The higher production pushed up the company’s cash flow per share by 75.9%, to $0.51 from $0.29.

Trilogy drilled 68 wells in 2011, with a 98.5% success rate. That pushed up the company’s production and boosted its reserves by 13%, to 88.6 million barrels from 78.2 million. That’s enough for over 11 years of production.

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ZARGON OIL & GAS $14.04 (Toronto symbol ZAR; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (403-264-9992; www.zargon.ca; Shares outstanding: 29.4 million; Market cap: $412.8 million; Dividend yield: 8.6%) produces natural gas and oil in Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and North Dakota. The company’s production is 61% oil and 39% natural gas.

In the three months ended December 31, 2011, Zargon produced 9,278 barrels of oil equivalent per day. That’s down slightly from 9.317 barrels a year earlier. However, that was mainly because the company sold some less important properties. Higher oil prices pushed up Zargon’s cash flow per share by 7.4%, to $0.58 from $0.54 a year earlier.

The company continues to successfully drill horizontal wells in the Alberta Plains North area. Horizontal drilling involves drilling development wells sideways or at an angle to reach isolated pockets of gas or to follow a reservoir spread out in a narrow layer. This method works well in places where conventional drilling is impossible or too expensive.

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Pat McKeough responds to many personal questions on specific stocks and other investing topics from the members of his Inner Circle. Every week, his comments and recommendations on a selection of the most intriguing questions of the past week go out to all Inner Circle members. And every Friday, we offer you one of the highlights from these Q&A sessions. This week, there was a question about a stock that has been on the rise, Canada’s biggest private liquor store operator. Pat examines the company’s prospects for future growth in Canada as well as the possible risks and rewards of U.S. expansion....

PEMBINA PIPELINE CORP. $27.59 (Toronto symbol PPL; Shares outstanding: 167.3 million; Market cap: $4.6 billion; TSI Network Rating: Average; Yield: 5.7%; www.pembina.com) is buying rival Provident Energy for $3.2 billion.

The Provident purchase diversifies Pembina’s operations and should immediately add to its cash flow. As a result, the company is raising its monthly dividend by 3.8%, to $0.135 from $0.13. The shares now yield 5.7%.

We’re raising Pembina’s TSINetwork Rating to Average from Extra Risk.

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Liquor Stores N.A. Ltd., $17.17, symbol LIQ on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 22.6 million; Market cap: $388.0 million; www.liquorstoresna.com), is Canada’s largest private liquor store operator, with 238 outlets. Of that total, 174 are in Alberta, 35 are in B.C., 20 are in Alaska and nine are in Kentucky. Liquor Stores’ banners include Liquor Depot, Liquor Barn and Brown Jug. Alberta privatized retail liquor sales in 1993, prompting Irv Kipnes to found Liquor Depot and Henry Bereznicki to start Liquor World that year. Kipnes and Bereznicki, both Edmonton-based real estate developers, merged their companies and founded Liquor Stores Income Fund in 2004. The fund first sold units to the public at $10 and began trading on Toronto in September 2004....

The Galileo High Income Plus Fund is a mutual fund that mainly holds stocks (28 in all), with an emphasis on high-yielding companies. This has led the fund to invest in a lot of former oil and gas trusts that have converted to dividend paying stocks. In fact, shares of energy companies make up 53.3% of the fund’s total assets. Galileo High Income Plus Fund has an MER of 2.56%. The Galileo High Income Plus Fund’s top holdings are Badger Daylighting, Baytex Energy, Black Diamond Group, Canadian Energy Services & Technology Group, Canadian Helicopters Group, Cervus Equipment, Gibson Energy, Noranda Income Fund, Pure Energy Services and Student Transportation Inc. The fund yields about 5.8%, based on its current net asset value and its latest monthly dividend payment. That high yield has a lot of appeal for a conservative, income-seeking investor. That definition traditionally applied to investors who want income to live on. Now, more and more, it also includes conservative, risk-averse investors who interpret steady income as the mark of a secure, low-risk investment. Despite the current high yield, however, the Galileo High Income Plus Fund comes with more risk than we advise for either type of income-seeker....

Poseidon Concepts rents its fluid-handling tanks to over 100 customers in the oil and gas industry. Poseidon has just issued 6.3 million new shares.