Scotia: best of a great bunch

Article Excerpt

Over the past few decades, I’ve often pointed out that the top five Canadian banks have provided some of the highest returns with least risk that you could find in our market. That’s why I’ve long recommended that all Canadian investors own two or more. The top five banks slumped deeply during the 2007-2009 market downturn, like most stocks. But since the market turnaround of March 2009, several of the top five have recovered and gone on (at least briefly) to all-time highs. Few other stock groups have done as well. We continue to recommend all five, but our favourite is still Bank of Nova Scotia (we analyze the other four banks later in this issue). BANK OF NOVA SCOTIA $49 (Toronto symbol BNS; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.0 billion; Market cap: $49.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.1; Dividend yield: 4.0%; SI Rating: Above Average) is Canada’s third-largest bank, with assets of $526.1 billion. Bank of Nova Scotia is the most international…