Topic: How To Invest

Dividend Advisor Hotline – Friday, December 23, 2022

Article Excerpt

BANK OF MONTREAL, $122.61, Toronto symbol BMO, remains a buy. With the February 2023 payment, Bank of Montreal will raise your quarterly dividend by 2.9%, to $1.43 a share from $1.39. The new annual rate of $5.72 yields a high 4.7%. In December 2021, the bank agreed to acquire California-based Bank of the West from France’s BNP Paribas for $16.3 billion U.S. Bank of the West provides a variety of retail and commercial banking services to over 1.8 million customers through 514 branches in 24 states, mainly in the Western and Midwestern regions of the U.S. It has assets of $105 billion U.S. and customer deposits totalling $89 billion U.S. To help finance the deal, Bank of Montreal sold 20.84 million common shares at $149.00 each for a total of $3.1 billion. Canada’s banking regulator—the Office of the Superintendent for Financial Institutions (OSFI)—has now increased the amount of capital that lenders must hold. That will help them better absorb a potential rise in loan defaults…