Higher defence budgets help CAE

Article Excerpt

CAE INC. $27 (Toronto symbol CAE; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 267.9 million; Market cap: $7.2 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.5; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.cae.com) is the world’s largest maker of flight simulators for commercial airlines and military clients. It also trains pilots. The U.S. government plans to spend $716 billion U.S. on its military operations in 2019. That’s up 12.7% from 2017. In addition, Canada plans to increase its annual defence spending from the current $19 billion to $33 billion by 2027. Those increases are good news for CAE, which gets roughly 40% of its revenue from military clients. As well, steady revenues from its military-related businesses offset the company’s exposure to commercial airlines and their cyclical air travel volumes. CAE is a buy. buy…