SAP

SAPUTO INC., $29.70, Toronto symbol SAP, will distribute its foods in Toronto from a new facility in Vaughn, Ontario (it currently distributes from a number of different warehouses in the city). The company will complete this consolidation in stages, and expects to be finished by the end of September 2010. As well, Saputo will close its plant in Brampton, Ontario, in October 2010. This plant processes milk and cheese products. The company will merge this plant’s operations with its other Ontario facilities. In all, these moves will cost Saputo $4.6 million. However, the company expects the plan to save it $6.5 million a year. To put these figures in context, Saputo earned $104.3 million, or $0.50 a share, in the three months ended December 31, 2009....

BCE INC., $28.60, Toronto symbol BCE, is starting to see the benefits of its restructuring plan, which began in July 2008. The plan included cutting jobs, relocating employees and selling extra real estate. The restructuring should save the company $400 million a year by the end of this year. In 2009, BCE’s earnings rose 6.5%, to $1.9 billion from $1.8 billion in the prior year. Per-share earnings rose 11.1%, to $2.50 from $2.25, on fewer shares outstanding. These figures exclude restructuring costs and other unusual items. The latest earnings beat the $2.49 a share that analysts were expecting. Revenue rose 0.4%, to $17.74 billion from $17.66 billion. BCE continues to lose residential phone customers to cable and wireless providers. The company now has 6.9 million local telephone subscribers, down 6.1% from the previous year. However, some of these customers are switching to the company’s own wireless service. BCE had 6.8 million wireless subscribers at the end of 2009. That’s a gain of 5.2% over the previous year....

ETFs have added to their advantages over closed-end funds over the last few years. That’s because ETFs have evolved, and competition has increased. Still, there are a lot of ETFs that have been created to tap into popular, but risky, themes and fads, so you need to be very selective with your ETF holdings. But the best ETFs offer a great combination of low fees and top-quality stocks. Below are five foreign ETFs we like. All have recovered from their lows earlier this year, but we think they still have room to rise. ISHARES MSCI EMERGING MARKETS INDEX FUND $41.85 (New York Exchange symbol EEM; buy or sell through brokers), is an ETF that aims to track the MSCI Emerging Markets Index....

ISHARES MSCI GERMANY FUND $22.95 (New York Exchange symbol EWG; buy or sell through brokers) is an ETF that aims to track the MSCI Germany Index. This index aims to capture 85% of the total market capitalization of the German stock market. The remaining 15% is unavailable for investment, partly because of limitations on foreign ownership. The fund’s top holdings are Siemens AG (engineering conglomerate), 9.6%; E.ON AG (energy), 9.6%; Bayer AG (diversified chemicals), 6.9%; Allianz (insurance), 6.7%; BASF (chemicals), 6.3%; Daimler AG (automobiles), 5.6%; Deutsche Bank AG, 5.0%; Deutsche Telekom AG, 4.9%; SAP AG (software), 4.8%; and RWE AG (energy and waste disposal), 4.4%. The fund’s industry breakdown is as follows: Financials, 19.9%; Industrials, 14.6%; Utilities, 14.2%; Consumer Discretionary, 13.6%; Materials, 12.6%; Health Care, 10.7%; Information Technology, 5.7%; Telecommunication Services, 4.9%; and Consumer Staples, 3.7%....

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) hold baskets of stocks that represent stock indexes. They trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks. Unlike many other innovations, including many mutual funds, ETFs don’t load you up with high management fees, or tie you down with heavy redemption charges if you decide to take your money out. Instead, they give you a low-cost and more flexible and convenient alternative. ETFs also have advantages over closed-end mutual funds. They are more liquid than most closed-end funds, and have lower management fees. Moreover, ETFs consistently trade at or very close to net asset value, unlike closed-end funds, which often go through wide swings in their discounts or premiums to the value of their assets....

AGRIUM INC., $53.94, Toronto symbol AGU, has raised its takeover offer for U.S.-based fertilizer maker CF Industries Holdings Inc. (New York symbol CF). CF shareholders will still receive one Agrium common share for each CF share they own. But they will also get $45.00 in cash, up from $40.00 under the old bid (all amounts except Agrium’s share price in U.S. dollars). This new offer expires November 18. Using current prices, Agrium’s offer is worth $95.50 per CF share (or a total of $4.6 billion). However, CF is trading at $79.02, or 17.3% below Agrium’s offer....

PENGROWTH ENERGY TRUST, $10.28, Toronto symbol PGF.UN, fell 7% on Friday after it cut its monthly distribution by 30%, to $0.07 a unit from $0.10. The new annual rate of $0.84 yields 8.2%. Pengrowth wants to conserve cash to pay down its $1.4-billion long-term debt, which is equal to 50% of its $2.8-billion market cap. The distribution cut should save Pengrowth roughly $93 million a year. The trust also wants to spend more on developing its oil and natural-gas properties in western Canada. These have large, proven reserves, so there is little risk in investing in them. The extra cash will also help Pengrowth buy other nearby properties....

BCE INC., $25.46, Toronto symbol BCE, continues to lower its costs in the face of tough competition for new phone customers. Its current restructuring plan, which includes cutting jobs, relocating employees and selling surplus real estate, should save the company $400 million a year, starting in 2010. In the three months ended June 30, 2009, BCE’s earnings rose 5.2%, to $447 million from $425 million a year earlier. Per-share earnings rose 9.4%, to $0.58 from $0.53, on fewer outstanding shares. These figures exclude costs related to the company’s restructuring and other unusual items. Revenue fell 2.1%, to $4.3 billion from $4.4 billion. The company continues to lose residential phone customers to cable companies and wireless providers, but these losses are slowing. As well, the recession is weighing on BCE’s wireless operations, which signed up 45,000 new customers during the quarter, compared to 83,000 a year earlier. Revenue per wireless user also fell by 4%. However, revenue from BCE’s satellite-TV services gained 9.3%, and high-speed Internet revenue rose 2.8%....

POTASH CORP. OF SASKATCHEWAN, $107.66, Toronto symbol POT, fell slightly on Friday after it lowered its second-quarter earnings forecast. Potash now expects to report earnings of $0.70 a share (all amounts except share price in U.S. dollars). That’s 46.2% below the midpoint of its earlier range of $1.10 to $1.50. Lower prices for crops, such as corn and wheat, continue to dampen fertilizer demand and prices. Plus, sales have been hurt by unusually dry conditions in the Canadian prairies and cool, wet weather in the U.S. Potash Corp. and other fertilizer makers, such as Agrium (see below), have cut their production in an effort to lower global inventories and push up prices. However, it will probably take several months before demand starts rising again....

MDS INC., $5.72, Toronto symbol MDS, is a life-sciences company that conducts contract-drug research for pharmaceutical companies, sells analytical devices (which scientists use to detect diseases) and supplies medical isotopes for cancer research. The company lost $17 million, or $0.15 a share, in the three months ended April 30, 2009 (all amounts except share price in U.S. dollars). The loss included a $16-million writedown of buildings and equipment at its drug-testing division. In the year-earlier quarter, MDS earned $13 million, or $0.11 a share. If you disregard the writedown and several other unusual charges, earnings per share fell 62.5%, to $0.03 from $0.08. That was well below the $0.06 a share that analysts were expecting. Revenue fell 19.4%, to $282 million from $350 million. Still, this was higher than the consensus estimate of $274.4 million. If you exclude the impact of foreign-exchange rates and the businesses that MDS bought and sold, its revenue fell 10%....