The following is a guest post by Donald Dony, who is the technical analyst and author behind the Technical Speculator. Bell Aliant: 7.11% The telecom giant has gone through a much needed transformation over the last few years.  From multiple mergers to restructuring the company into deferent components, the company has transformed its self into a communication company giant. Based in Atlantic Canada, with over 9,000 employees, this company is still 44% owned by its larger parent company of Bell  Canada. The fundamentals are what investors expect from a big telecom company. Steady earnings, a modest P/E and a good healthy dividend. And for investors looking for low volatility, this is a good pick.  The beta is 0.027.  With earnings per share (EPS) at 1.44 and a P/E of 18.50, this is definitely not a growth story.  Valuations still rank in the top half of all telecom/utilities companies in Canada. The big plus is the dividend.  There are few telecoms that can match the 7.11% dividend. Technically, ...

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Image credit: welcomia / 123RF Stock Photo I’ve written a guest post over on The Dividend Pig. It was easy to get my post approved. The post is titled, Opportunity in the Canadian Mining Sector.  It is a review of three Canadian mining stocks listed on the NYSE, and is intended for U.S. investors who may not be familiar with Canadian resource companies. I review the sector in relation to its possible value play, as well as briefly review three company fundamentals. Here is a snippet: “Many investors don’t think of mining stocks as dividend growth companies, because of their lower dividend yields. The sector has largely been overlooked by the Canadian dividend investing crowd. Yet these are dividend growth companies with strong balance sheets. They have recently raised their dividends, and have more potential for share price increase. “ “Take PotashCorp (POT) as an example, which recently raised its dividend by a whopping 33%. By avoiding the lower-yield mining companies, ...

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The following post is written by Roger Conrad. Potential shortage of oil pipelines? Sometime early in the next decade the US will overtake Saudi Arabia as the world’s most prolific producer of oil. That’s according to the US Energy Information Administration. The key is new technology that’s unlocked vast reservoirs of oil and natural gas heretofore trapped under shale. And it’s spurred a production boom in Canada as well from previously untapped areas such as the Cardium Formation, the Duvernay Shale and the Montney Shale. The North American energy explosion has the potential to enrich scores of individual companies and their investors as well as to provide an immense economic benefit to the US and Canada. There’s just one problem: Rising production to date has run well ahead of the ability to get the energy to market. Simply, most of today’s prime areas of energy production from shale haven’t been drilled in the recent past. As a result they lack adequate pipelines, gathering ...

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courtesy of www.visitcalgary.com Written by Rob, The Dividend Apprentice. Westjet Airlines Ltd (WJA) released their Q3 profit results yesterday, announcing a whopping year over year increase of nearly 80%. Their EPS came in at 52 cents, up from 28 cents the year before and far exceeding expert predictions of 42 cents per share. One of Canada’s 4 biggest airlines, Westjet employs more that 8800 workers across North America, Central America and the Caribbean. Founded in 1996, they quickly gained a reputation for a friendly, laid back atmosphere offering increased leg room, leather seats and seatback television entertainment. A great customer experience and cheaper flights than their competition has been their governing philosophy, as evidenced in their “Owners Care” advertisements. Westjet also took this time to announce their president for Westjet Encore, Westjet’s new regional carrier. Ferio Pugliese, previously Westjet’s executive vice-president for people, ...

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TransCanada Corp (TRP) and Phoenix Energy Holdings Ltd. announce Grand Rapids Pipeline project. TransCanada Corp (TRP) and Phoenix Energy Holdings Ltd. have announced a proposal to build a C$3 Billion pipeline project in northern Alberta. Named the Grand Rapids Pipeline, it will carry crude oil and diluent (a kind of thinner to help the crude flow freely through the pipelines) from the Athabasca oil sands northwest of Fort McMurray 500 km south to the Edmonton-Hartland area. The pipeline will help fill the increasing need for oil transportation infrastructure surrounding the even growing oil sands regions of northern Alberta. The routing of the Grand Rapids Pipeline has yet to be finalized, with specific concerns relating to the environment, aboriginal and stakeholder input, as well as economics and land use still to be addressed. If the project is granted regulatory approval next year, TransCanada expects to be transporting as much as 900,000 barrels of crude oil plus over 300,000 barrels ...

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