stock pickers

MCCOY CORP. (Toronto symbol MCB; www.mccoyglobal.com) operates through two divisions: Mobile Solutions and Energy Products and Services....

DOMINO’S PIZZA INC., $55.98, symbol DPZ on New York, is the world’s largest chain of pizza stores that offer takeout and delivery. It operates10,040 outlets in the U.S. and over 70 other countries. Franchisees run most of these stores. Excluding one-time items, the company’s earnings per share rose 25.5% in the quarter ended March 24, 2013, to $0.59 from $0.47 a year earlier. Sales rose 8.6%, to $417.6 million from $384.6 million. Same-store sales rose 6.5% internationally and 6.2% in the U.S. Domino’s continues to boost its sales by aggressively promoting its new pizza recipes. It’s also profiting by moving into ordering online and through software applications, or apps, on smartphones. In addition, Domino’s still has lots of growth potential overseas....

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....

FAIR ISAAC CORP., $44.18, symbol FICO on New York, makes FICO Scores, a computer program that helps businesses make better decisions about customer creditworthiness. FICO Scores dominates this niche market. In addition, Fair Isaac continues to profit by selling software that helps credit card issuers control fraud and analyze cardholders’ spending patterns. In its fiscal 2013 second quarter, which ended March 31, 2013, Fair Isaac’s earnings per share before one-time items rose 4.4% from a year ago, to $0.69 from $0.66. Revenue rose 12.4%, to $179.3 million from $159.5 million. That’s largely because the company recently acquired Adeptra, which makes systems that let businesses communicate with customers through a range of channels, including voice, instant messaging, mobile applications and email. Fair Isaac continues to spend around 8% of its revenue on research. That lets it keep producing innovative new products that help it stay ahead of its competitors....

SHERRITT INTERNATIONAL (Toronto symbol S; www.sherritt.com) is a natural resource company that produces nickel, cobalt, thermal coal, oil and gas. It also manages 356 megawatts of power generation capacity in Cuba, with an additional 150 megawatts starting up this year. The company is a major nickel producer, with operations in Cuba and Canada. As well, it is now starting up its 40%-owned Ambatovy mine on the island nation of Madagascar, off Africa’s east coast. Sherritt also produces oil and gas in Cuba, Spain and Pakistan and is Canada’s largest thermal coal producer....

YAMANA GOLD INC., $11.81, symbol YRI on Toronto, owns seven operating gold mines in Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Argentina. It also holds a 12.5% stake in the Alumbrera copper/gold project in Argentina and has three other properties in advanced stages of development. The stock fell 11% this week in response to concerns that Cyprus may sell some of its gold reserves as it deals with its financial crisis. Investors, who typically buy gold as a hedge against inflation, are also worried that the U.S. Federal Reserve may scale back its quantitative easing policy, which would slow inflation. As a result, gold prices fell from around $1,500 U.S. an ounce to today’s price of $1,401. We feel Yamama’s high-quality mines give it an edge over other junior gold companies. It also plans to increase its production by at least 20% in 2013. Moreover, Yamana’s strong balance sheet is a plus: its debt of $765.9 million (as of December 31, 2012) is a low 8.6% of its $8.9-billion market cap. The company also held cash of $349.6 million, or $0.46 a share....

RUBY TUESDAY INC., $9.10, symbol RT on New York, reports that its revenue fell 4.2% in its fiscal 2013 third quarter, which ended March 5, 2013, to $307.4 million from $320.7 million a year earlier. That’s partly because Ruby Tuesday closed less profitable restaurants in the quarter. It now has 709 company-owned and 77 franchised casual-dining outlets in the U.S. and 11 other countries. Same-restaurant sales fell 2.8% at its company-owned outlets and 1.7% at the franchised locations. The company recently discontinued the new restaurant concepts it was developing: Marlin & Ray’s (seafood), Truffles Grill and Wok Hay (Asian food). If you disregard the cost of closing these outlets and other unusual items, Ruby Tuesday would have earned $0.10 a share in the latest quarter. That missed the consensus estimate of $0.11. The latest earnings are also down 54.5% from $0.22 a share a year earlier....

When investors base buy and sell decisions on short-term market forecasts, they often experience notably poor investment results, or even lose money. This may come as a shock to them. In hindsight, it may seem that past market trends, up or down, should have been easy to foresee. But in fact, nobody consistently foresees these trends. That’s why most investors hurt their returns if they let short-term market forecasts have much of an impact on their investment decisions. This year, investors may feel tempted to follow the long-time saying that you should, “Sell in May and go away.” This saying is based on the observation that, over the years, stock prices have often gone sideways or dropped between May and October. This year, the sell-in-May rule may seem particularly timely. The market was stronger this year than many observers expected, so they may see it as over-due for a setback. The problem with this kind of analysis is that it fails to distinguish between causation and correlation. The pattern of falling stock prices between May and October may simply be a coincidence, like the pattern that may appear in a series of coin tosses or spins of a roulette wheel....

WESTJET AIRLINES LTD., $25.00, symbol WJA on Toronto, reports that its load factor rose to a record 84.3% in the first quarter of 2013 from 83.0% a year earlier. Load factor is the percentage of available seats that are occupied by paying passengers. More important, the rise came despite the fact that the company increased its capacity by 6.0% to meet higher demand. Revenue passenger miles (the total number of paying passengers on each plane multiplied by the distance travelled in miles) rose 7.8% in the latest quarter. The company is also upgrading its newer planes to include a section with greater legroom and other benefits, such as priority boarding. As well, new partnerships with international airlines like Air France are helping WestJet attract more passengers....

Heavy equipment distributor Toromont Industries Ltd. completed the spinoff of its natural gas equipment division, Enerflex Ltd., in July 2011. Shareholders received shares of the new Toromont and shares of Enerflex. Here is our latest report on these two Canadian stocks which we follow in our advisory for more aggressive investing, Stock Pickers Digest....