Pfizer Inc.

Anadys Pharmaceuticals, $6.25, symbol ANDS on Nasdaq (Shares outstanding: 28.9 million; Market cap: $180.5 million), is developing new drugs to treat hepatitis C and cancer. San Diego-based Anadys first sold shares to the public at $7 each, and began trading on the Nasdaq in March 2004. In the United States, once a new drug clears the initial testing phase, it must pass the three main stages of clinical evaluation used by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In Phase I trials, a small group of 20 to 80 healthy volunteers is selected to assess the new drug’s safety, tolerability and possible side effects....

Paladin Labs, $14, symbol PLB on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 14.9 million; Market cap: $209.0 million), is a Montreal-based specialty pharmaceutical company. Paladin sells its drugs to Canadian doctors who focus on urology, dermatology, pain management and women’s health. Paladin mainly buys, licences and markets drugs. It specializes in drugs with patents that are about to expire, and under-promoted drugs from large pharmaceutical companies, like Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly, Novartis and Pfizer. Paladin also buys new drugs, or those that are close to having their patents approved. It mainly gets these from small-to-medium sized pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies with no sales and marketing presence in Canada. Aside from handling other companies’ drugs, Paladin expects to launch several new drugs of its own over the next two years....

ECONOMIC INVESTMENT TRUST $50 (Toronto symbol: EVT) holds a well-diversified portfolio of high-quality Canadian, U.S. and foreign stocks. The $510.3-million fund’s largest holdings include E-L Financial, Algoma Central Railway, Chevron, Nissan Motor, Royal Dutch Shell, Altria Group, Pfizer, ConocoPhillips, Allianz SE, BASF SE, ING Group and Vodafone Group plc. The fund breaks down geographically as follows: Canada, 55%; U.S., 14.2%, Europe, 19.6%, Asia, 11%; and Latin America, 0.2%....

Johnson & Johnson, $56.89, symbol JNJ on New York (Shares outstanding: 2.8 billion; Market cap: $157.8 billion), makes and sells health-care products. The company’s major business segments are: consumer (25% of total sales), pharmaceutical (38%) and medical devices & diagnostics (37%). Its consumer brands include Band-Aid, Tylenol and Stayfree, as well as Listerine, Rogaine and Sudafed. About 50% of its sales are international. In December 2006, Johnson & Johnson bought Pfizer Consumer Healthcare for $16.6 billion in cash. This purchase added leading brands and new segments, such as mouthwash and anti-smoking products, to Johnson & Johnson’s consumer division. Johnson & Johnson bought HealthMedia in October 2008, and two months later it added Omrix Biopharmaceuticals. HealthMedia offers automated online health counselling for companies to offer to their employees, and Omrix develops and markets biosurgical and immunotherapy products. In the three months ended December 31, 2008, Johnson & Johnson’s sales fell 4.9%, to $15.2 billion from $16 billion a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, earnings rose 3.1%, to $2.63 billion from $2.55 billion. Earnings per share rose 6.8%, to $0.94 from $0.88 on 3% fewer shares outstanding. Research and development spending was $2.1 billion, or 13.9% of sales....

S&P DEPOSITORY RECEIPTS $87.32 (American Exchange symbol SPY; buy or sell through brokers) are commonly called ‘Spiders’. The fund holds the stocks in the S&P 500 Index. This index is comprised of 500 major U.S. stocks chosen for market size, liquidity, and industry group representation. The 10 highest weighted stocks on the index are Exxon Mobil, Procter & Gamble, General Electric, AT&T, Johnson & Johnson, Chevron Corp., Microsoft, Wal-Mart Stores, JP Morgan Chase & Co. and Pfizer. Expenses for the fund are just 0.10% of assets. If you want exposure to the S&P 500 Index, S&P Depository Receipts are a buy.

We still think high-quality mutual funds with a long-term focus will beat indexes over long periods. If funds invest as we advise — sticking with well-established companies and spreading their assets out across the five main economic sectors — they will tend to lose a lot less than the market indexes in periods when the indexes fall sharply. That’s because big market slides are particularly hard on the hottest, most popular stocks of the preceding market rise, and investing as we do leads you to avoid excessive investment in the hot stocks. Index funds, in contrast, do tend to load up on the hottest, most popular stocks as they rise. That’s because, as they rise, these stocks make up a rising proportion of the index. The most recent example is Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, which had the highest market cap on the Toronto exchange in June, 2008, on the strength of soaring fertilizer and agriculture prices. The shares have since dropped 70%....

UNITED CORPORATIONS $47 (Toronto symbol: UNC) (165 University Ave., 10th Floor, Toronto, ON M5H 3B8. 416-947-2583. Buy or sell through a broker) invests in a wide variety of average-quality to above-average quality Canadian and foreign stocks. At last report, 35.3% of the fund’s $1.0 billion portfolio was invested in Canadian equities, 23.7% in the U.S., 20.2% in Europe, 6.3% in the UK, 12.5% in Asia and 1.0% in Mexico and Latin America. The fund’s largest holdings included Bank of Nova Scotia, EnCana, Royal Bank, Nexen, Potash Corp., Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Manulife, TD Bank, Pfizer and CN Railway....

UNITED CORPORATIONS $62 (Toronto symbol: UNC) (165 University Ave., 10th Floor, Toronto, ON M5H 3B8. 416-947-2583. Buy or sell through a broker) invests in a wide variety of average-quality to above-average quality Canadian and foreign stocks. At last report, 35.3% of the fund’s $1.0 billion portfolio was invested in Canadian equities, 23.7% in the U.S., 20.2% in Europe, 6.3% in the UK, 12.5% in Asia and 1.0% in Mexico and Latin America. The fund’s largest holdings included Bank of Nova Scotia, Royal Bank of Canada, Manulife, Talisman Energy, Algoma Central Corporation, Nexen, TransCanada Corporation, Pfizer Inc., TD Bank and Chevron....

S&P DEPOSITORY RECEIPTS $144 (American Exchange symbol SPY; buy or sell through brokers) are commonly called ‘Spiders’. The fund holds the stocks in the S&P 500 Index. This index is comprised of 500 major U.S. stocks chosen for market size, liquidity, and industry group representation....

The best exchange-traded funds (ETFs) offer well-diversified, tax-efficient portfolios with very low management fees. Due to buyback and share issue arrangements, ETFs always trade close to their net asset value. Here are some of the best deals available in ETFs. We’ve also analysed one we don’t like. ISHARES CDN LARGECAP 60 INDEX FUND $76.72 (Toronto symbol XIU; buy or sell through a broker) (formerly called iUnits S&P/TSX 60 Index Participation Fund) is a good low-fee way to buy the top stocks on the TSE. The units hold a basket of stocks that represent the S&P/TSX 60 Index. The index is made up of the 60 largest and most heavily traded stocks on the TSE....