Utilities target new markets outside of Canada

Article Excerpt

FORTIS INC. $42 (Toronto symbol FTS; Income-Growth Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 421.2 million; Market cap: $17.7 billion; Dividend yield 4.0%; Dividend Sustainability Rating: Highest; www.fortisinc.com) owns electrical utilities across Canada, the U.S. and the Caribbean. It also distributes natural gas in British Columbia, Arizona and New York State. The company recently raised its quarterly dividend by 6.25%, to $0.425 a share from $0.40. The new annual rate of $1.70 yields 4.0%. Fortis has now increased its dividend each year for the past 44 years. It plans to raise that annual payment by about 6% each year through 2022. In October 2016, Fortis acquired ITC Holdings Corp. for $11.8 billion U.S. ITC owns high voltage power lines in the U.S. Midwest. Fortis later sold 19.9% of ITC to Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund for $1.2 billion U.S. Fortis’s earnings in the three months ended December 31, 2017, fell 29.1%, to $134 million from $189 million a year earlier. Due to more shares outstanding, earnings…