How To Invest
In addition, Pat thinks then beginner investors should cultivate two important qualities: a healthy sense of skepticism and patience.
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Investors should approach all investments with a healthy sense of skepticism. This can help keep you out of fraudulent stocks that masquerade as high-quality stocks. It will also keep you out of legally operated, but poorly managed, companies that promise more than they can possibly deliver.
If you are a new investor, you should also realize that losing patience can cause you to sell your best choices right before a big rise. All too often, investors buy a promising stock just as it enters a period of price stagnation. Even the best-performing stocks run into these unpredictable phases from time to time. They move mainly sideways in a wide range for months or years before their next big rise begins. (Stock brokers often refer to these stocks as “dead money.”)
If you lack patience, you run a big risk of selling your best choices in the midst of one of these phases, prior to the next big move upward. If you lose patience and sell, you are particularly likely to do so in the low end of the trading range, when stock prices have weakened and confidence in the stock has waned.
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ENBRIDGE INC. $46.75 (Toronto symbol ENB; Shares outstanding: 867.6 million; Market cap: $40.8 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Divd. yield: 4.5%; www.enbridge.com) has agreed to sell 56.6 million common shares at $40.70 a share to several major brokerage firms to raise $2.3 billion. Enbridge will put that cash toward $18.2 billion in spending on new pipelines, wind farms and other projects between 2016 and 2019. The company has already secured shipping commitments from oil producers and other clients. That should cut the risk for these new projects. The extra cash flow from the new operations will allow Enbridge to increase its dividend by 10% to 12% a year through 2019; the current annual rate of $2.12 a share yields 4.5%. However, the stock is somewhat expensive at 21.0 times its projected 2016 earnings of $2.23 a share....
IBM $136.30 (New York symbol IBM; Shares outstanding: 970.1 million; Market cap: $130.4 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.8%; www.ibm.com) will buy Truven Health Analytics, a private firm that provides hospitals and pharmaceutical companies with analytic data services. Truven will become part of IBM’s Watson Health business. It uses advanced artificialintelligence technology to process and analyze large volumes of data, including patient records, drug information and insurance claims. That helps hospitals and clinics reduce errors and cut their costs. IBM will pay $2.6 billion for Truven when it completes the purchase later this year....
PENGROWTH ENERGY $1.18 (Toronto symbol PGF; Shares outstanding: 543.0 million; Market cap: $564.8 million; TSINetwork Rating: Average; No dividends paid; www.pengrowth.com) produces oil and natural gas, mostly in Western Canada. This includes its Lindbergh oil sands project in Alberta. Pengrowth has suspended its $0.01-a-share quarterly dividend in response to the sharp decline in oil prices. It will also reduce its capital spending to between $60 million to $70 million in 2016, from $184 million in 2015. The company also laid off workers. That should save it $25 million in 2016. In addition, Pengrowth aims to sell $600 million of less important properties. These funds will probably go toward paying down its $2.1 billion debt. That’s now 3.7 times its depressed market cap....
MARKET VECTORS VIETNAM ETF $14.25 (New York symbol VNM; buy or sell through brokers) holds Vietnamese companies and foreign firms that get a significant amount of their revenue from Vietnam. The ETF’s top holdings are Vincom Corp. (real estate), 7.8%; Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam, 7.5%; Masan Group (a food, resources and banking conglomerate), 6.5%; Saigon Thuong Tin Commercial Bank, 6.3%; and Baoviet Holdings (insurance), 6.1%. The ETF cuts risk by investing part of its assets in firms that are based outside of Vietnam but still do business there. That’s a better approach than adding thinly traded or illiquid shares of smaller Vietnamese firms....
CANADIAN REIT $43.00 (Toronto symbol REF.UN; Units outstanding: 73.0 million; Market cap: $3.1 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; Dividend yield: 4.2%; www.creit.ca) owns 197 properties, including retail, industrial and office buildings, across Canada and in Chicago. These holdings contain 24.9 million square feet of leasable area. The trust’s occupancy rate is 93.8%. In the three months ended December 31, 2015, Canadian REIT’s revenue rose 1.0%, to $110.6 million from $109.5 million a year earlier. Cash flow per unit gained 1.3%, to $0.76 from $0.754. The trust aims to expand by developing its own properties rather than through large acquisitions. Over the next two to three years, it’s developing 12 projects to add 1.1 million square feet of space. Canadian REIT takes on partners to help carry out big projects....
ISHARES CDN REIT SECTOR INDEX FUND $15.10 (Toronto symbol XRE; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) holds the 15 Canadian real estate investment trusts in the S&P/TSX Capped REIT Index. Expenses for iShares CDN REIT are 0.60% of its assets. The fund yields 6.0%. The ETF’s largest holding is RioCan REIT at 20.6%, followed by H&R REIT (12.9%), Canadian Apartment Properties REIT (9.2%), Smart REIT (9.1%), Canadian REIT (7.7%), Allied Properties REIT (6.4%), Cominar REIT (6.2%), Dream Office REIT (5.4%), Boardwalk REIT (4.7%), Granite REIT (4.5%), Artis REIT (4.2%), Crombie REIT (2.6%), Dream Global REIT (2.2%), Pure Industrial REIT (2.1%) and Northview Apartment REIT (1.9%)....
ENCANA $6.14 (Toronto symbol ECA; Shares outstanding: 849.8 million; Market cap: $4.9 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 1.4%; www.encana.com) plans to spend $1.5 billion to $1.7 billion upgrading its properties in 2016, down 25% from 2015 (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). Even with the drop, it expects production at its four main oil projects—Montney (B.C.), Duvernay (Alberta) and Eagle Ford and Permian (both in Texas)—will rise 12% this year. The company has also cut its annual dividend rate by 78.6%, to $0.06 a share from $0.28. In addition, Encana has eliminated the 2% price discount it offered to shareholders who chose to reinvest their dividends in new shares. In all, these moves will save $185 million a year....
NEWMONT MINING $26.26 (New York symbol NEM; Shares outstanding: 529.1 million; Market cap: $13.4 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 0.4%; www.newmont.com) is one of the world’s largest gold and copper producers, with major mines in the U.S., Peru, Suriname, Australia, Ghana and Indonesia. Newmont’s shares have gained 41% since the start of 2016. That’s mainly because the recent volatility in global stock markets has pushed up gold prices during the same period by 17% to $1,242 an ounce. Rising gold prices will also improve the profitability of Newmont’s Cripple Creek & Victor gold mine in Nevada. The company acquired the operation in August 2015. Newmont expects its overall operating costs will fall as it opens new mines in the next few years....
It’s generally a bad idea to invest in companies that are active in a declining industry. When demand is shrinking, you have to work harder every year just to maintain your current position. But sometimes, the competitive advantages of a particular company can override a bad industry outlook.
For instance, the tobacco industry has been on the decline since the 1960s....
For instance, the tobacco industry has been on the decline since the 1960s....
Supremex, $5.45, symbol SXP on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 28.8 million; Market cap: $154.7 million; www.supremex.com), is a leading North American maker of envelopes, and also sells packaging and specialty products. The company has plants in seven Canadian provinces and two in the U.S. Supremex converted from an income trust to a conventional corporation on January 1, 2011. In 2011, the company had revenue of $143.9 million. That fell to $131.9 million in 2013, and to $129.0 million in 2014. The main reason was a steady decline in the use of envelopes by businesses and by individuals (due to email and the Internet), especially in Canada....