wall street

Here’s Part One of the letter I sent to our Portfolio Management clients in August 2023:

“Here’s a list of four disturbing issues that trouble many people these days, especially investors.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) only crossed the fiction-to-news barrier in recent years, after decades as a staple of Arnold Schwarzenegger films....

Over the years, you may have noted more and more media references to all sorts of studies and investigations that claim to have made hard-to-believe breakthrough discoveries in various fields—cancer-curing food supplements, pharmaceuticals that cure baldness, cold fusion techniques that can create energy out of worthless or extremely cheap materials, and so on....

Investors buying U.S. stocks in Canada can get international exposure—especially when looking at the Consumer sector for investments

FLOWSERVE CORP., $35.71, symbol FLS on New York, manufactures industrial pumps, valves, and other machinery, for several industries that use difficult-to-handle or corrosive fluids. These include power, oil and gas, chemicals, and several others. It operates facilities in more than 300 locations worldwide, selling its products in over 50 countries.

In February 2023, Flowserve announced that it would acquire Velan Inc....

Here’s Part Two of the most-recent letter I sent to our Portfolio Management clients in February 2023:

“ Yes, but what about World War III?

After Russia invaded Ukraine around this time last year, I began to wonder if there was any real risk that this marked the start of World War III.

After all, a lot of academics seemed to be writing about the Thucydides Trap (which I mentioned in our client letter last fall), based on what seemed like rising trade tension between the U.S....

Investing part of your portfolio in aggressive investments can pay off. But buying aggressive short-term investments can put a big dent in your stock-market returns

TMX GROUP LTD. $139 is a hold. The company (Toronto symbol X; Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 55.6 million; Market cap: $7.7 billion; Dividend yield: 2.4%; Takeover Target Rating: Medium; www.tmx.com) owns Canada’s two primary stock exchanges, the Toronto Stock Exchange and the Montreal Exchange, as well as clearing entities for domestic Canadian markets (CDS and CDCC).


TMX Group is now paying an undisclosed sum for Boston-based Wall Street Horizon Inc....

TMX GROUP LTD., $135.65, symbol X on Toronto, is an operator of public trading platforms and a provider of ancillary services. The company owns Canada’s two primary stock exchanges, the Toronto Stock Exchange and the Montreal Exchange, as well as clearing entities for domestic Canadian markets (CDS and CDCC)....

SUNCOR ENERGY INC., $48.70, Toronto symbol SU, remains a buy.

The company is Canada’s largest integrated oil firm, with major projects in the Alberta oil sands. Suncor also operates four refineries (three in Canada and one in Colorado), along with 1,875 Petro-Canada gas stations.

With the June 2022 payment, Suncor increased your quarterly dividend by 11.9%....

ALPHABET INC., Nasdaq symbols GOOG $96.58 [class C: non-voting] and GOOGL $96.29 [class A: one vote per share], is your #1 Aggressive Buy for 2022.

The stock is the parent of Google, the world’s leading Internet search engine. It gets most of its revenue from online advertising.

In addition to search, Google also offers a variety of other services and products....