telus

Toronto symbol T.A, provides local and long distance telephone service in B.C., Alberta and parts of Quebec, and wireless service across Canada.

Telus Corporation (also shortened and referred to as Telus Corp, and stylized as TELUS) is a Canadian publicly traded holding company and conglomerate, headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, which is the parent company of several subsidiaries: Telus Communications offers telephony, television, data and Internet services; Telus Mobility offers wireless services; Telus Health operates companies that provide health products and services; and Telus Digital operates worldwide, providing multilingual customer service outsourcing and digital IT services. Telus has a long history and is listed with the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX:T).

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TELUS $43.67 (Toronto symbol T; Shares outstanding: 60750 million; Market cap: $26.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.9%; www.telus.com) is closing its remaining 59 Black’s photography stores.

Telus paid $28 million for the 113-store Black’s chain in 2009. It felt these outlets would help it sell more mobile phones and service plans. However, digital camera sales have suffered as more people take pictures with their smartphones.

The company will transfer many Black’s employees to its other retail outlets, so any severance costs will be low.

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Since 2000, Telus has spent $27 billion—roughly its current market cap—to boost the speed and capacity of its wireless and high-speed Internet networks. Meantime, its strong customer service is helping it hang on to current subscribers. These strengths should keep fuelling the company’s stock, which is up 155% in the past 15 years, while its rising earnings mean its dividend hikes and share buybacks will continue. TELUS CORP. $45 (Toronto symbol T; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 605.5 million; Market cap: $27.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.2; Dividend yield: 3.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.telus.com) is Canada’s second-largest wireless carrier, after Rogers Communications, with 8.2 million subscribers. Wireless now supplies 55% of Telus’s revenue and 66% of its earnings....
Like Telus (see page 71), BCE and Manitoba Telecom are speeding up their networks to profit from demand for faster downloads—both through high-speed Internet and wirelessly. Both companies can easily afford to make these investments and maintain their dividends, but we feel BCE is the better choice right now. BCE INC. $55 (Toronto symbol BCE; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 841.9 million; Market cap: $46.3 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.2; Dividend yield: 4.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.bce.ca) is Canada’s largest telephone provider, with 7.0 million customers in Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces. It also has 3.3 million highspeed Internet users and 2.7 million TV subscribers....
TELUS $43.67 (Toronto symbol T; Shares outstanding: 60750 million; Market cap: $26.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.9%; www.telus.com) is closing its remaining 59 Black’s photography stores. Telus paid $28 million for the 113-store Black’s chain in 2009. It felt these outlets would help it sell more mobile phones and service plans. However, digital camera sales have suffered as more people take pictures with their smartphones. The company will transfer many Black’s employees to its other retail outlets, so any severance costs will be low....
TRANSCONTINENTAL INC., $16.06, Toronto symbol TCL.A, fell 12% this week after reporting lower-than-expected earnings. In its 2015 second quarter, which ended April 30, 2015, the company’s earnings rose 13.7%, to $39.1 million, or $0.50 a share. That fell short of the consensus estimate of $0.54. A year earlier, Transcontinental earned $34.4 million, or $0.44 a share. The gain largely came from two recent acquisitions: in May 2014, the company bought U.S.-based Capri Packaging, a maker of plastic bags and pouches for cheese and other dairy products, for $146.5 million. And in June 2014, it paid Sun Media $78.8 million for 74 weekly newspapers in Quebec....
CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY LTD. $208.00 (Toronto symbol CP; Shares outstanding: 164.0 million; Market cap: $34.0 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 0.7%; www.cpr.ca) fell recently in response to Teck Resources’ decision to shut down its six Western Canadian coal mines for about three weeks in the third quarter of 2015. The company is closing the mines because China’s slowing economic growth has hurt sales to steelmakers, while Australia’s rising coal production has depressed prices. CP has an exclusive contract to ship coal from five of Teck’s southeastern B.C. mines to the Port of Vancouver. In the first quarter of 2015, coal shipments from Teck and other miners accounted for 10% of the railroad’s revenue. The company is aggressively cutting costs and improving efficiency. Its plans include speeding up trains and reducing the amount of time they spend at terminals. These moves should help CP offset the lost revenue....
TELUS CORP. $42 (www.telus.com) continues to benefit from strong demand for wireless services. As of March 31, 2015, it had 8.3 million wireless subscribers, up 3.1% from a year earlier. In addition, more of these users are upgrading to smartphones under long-term contracts, which generate higher profits for Telus than regular cellphones....
TELUS $42.36 (Toronto symbol T; Shares outstanding: 609.0 million; Market cap: $25.9 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.8%; www.telus.com) has issued $1.75 billion worth of new long-term notes. The company will use the proceeds to pay for its recent $1.5-billion purchase of new AWS-3 radio frequencies (or wireless spectrum). Telus will use this spectrum to boost its wireless services’ speed and capacity. That will encourage more of its subscribers to upgrade to smartphones, which are more profitable for Telus than regular cellphones. The new notes will increase Telus’s long-term debt to around $11.2 billion, or a high 43% of its $25.9-billion market cap. However, the company’s annual free cash flow (or cash flow minus capital expenditures) is $1.1 billion, which gives it plenty of flexibility to pay down its debt. In addition, Telus has staggered its loan maturities to 2045, so its annual repayments remain manageable....
CANADIAN TIRE CORP., $133.55, Toronto symbol CTC.A, recently sold 20% of its financial services division to Bank of Nova Scotia (Toronto symbol BNS) for $500 million. That’s the main reason why the company’s earnings fell 3.0% in the quarter ended April 4, 2015, to $68.5 million from $70.6 million a year earlier. Per-share profits were unchanged at $0.88 on fewer shares outstanding, but that beat the consensus estimate of $0.87. Overall sales fell 2.3%, to $2.5 billion from $2.6 billion, mainly because lower gasoline prices hurt revenue at Canadian Tire’s gas stations. But if you exclude fuel-station revenue, the company’s overall sales gained 2.2%....
TELUS CORP. $42 (www.telus.com) continues to benefit from strong demand for wireless services. As of March 31, 2015, it had 8.3 million wireless subscribers, up 3.1% from a year earlier. In addition, more of these users are upgrading to smartphones under long-term contracts, which generate higher profits for Telus than regular cellphones....