Daily roundup of research and analysis from The Globe and Mail’s market strategist Scott Barlow
The research team at RBC updated their list of top picks in Canadian small caps and provided performance details,
“The Q4/21 Canadian Small Cap Conviction List has seen a total return of 7.2% quarter-to-date, with the non-resource portion +5.5% QTD and the resource portion +9.8% QTD. This compares to the S&P TSX Small Cap Index total return of +11.5% QTD and the S&P TSX Composite Index total return of +8.3%.”
The analyst-driven stock selections are divided into resource and non-resource companies. Non-resource picks are Alaris Equity Partner Income Trust, BSR REIT, Cargojet Inc., Chemtrade Logistics Income Fund, ECN Capital Corp., European Residential REIT, Home Capital Group Inc., Jamieson Wellness Inc., Lifespeak Inc., Minto Apartment REIT, Park Lawn Corp., Points International Ltd., Transcontinental Inc. , and Westshore Terminals Investment Corp..
The resource picks are Argonaut Gold, Interfor Corp., Major Drilling Group International Inc., Osisko Mining Inc., Precision Drilling Corp., Storm Resources Ltd., Tamarack Valley Energy Ltd., Tidewater Midstream and Infrastructure Ltd. and Western Forest Products.
“RBC small cap conviction list” – (table) Twitter
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BMO chief economist Doug Porter warns Canadians that housing prices do not always go up,
“There is a sense among some that the Canadian housing market can never falter. After all, in the face of more than a decade’s worth of dire warnings, prices have mostly climbed relentlessly. Looking back to the start of the century, the market has had only two brief stumbles, even after adjusting for inflation. (Look to the MLS HPI as the best measure there, because it takes out any distortions from shifts into/out of Toronto and Vancouver alone.) On a two-year basis, prices stalled during the financial crisis and the resulting 2008/09 recession, and then again late last decade amid non-resident taxes and BoC tightening. But, realistically, it’s mostly been a one-way trip north for the past 20 years. We are here to tell you that it was not ever thus. Note the two brutal corrections in the early 1980s and then again through the first half of the 1990s. In fact, had you bought a home in 1989, your investment would still have been down in inflation-adjusted terms 15 long years later. To be clear, we are not in the “deep correction” camp, but we are in the camp that believes housing does not always and everywhere rise in value.”
“BMO: “[Canadian] housing does not always and everywhere rise in value” – (research excerpt) Twitter
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BofA Securities has published a list of top U.S. ETF picks. The sectors with favourable views are financials, health care and industrials. I’m assuming domestic investors would prefer to own domestic financials, so I’ll concentrate on health care and industrial picks where U.S. markets are much deeper than the TSX.
The top rated health care ETFs are Vanguard HealthCare ETF, Fidelity MSCI Health Care Index Fund, HealthCare Select Sector SPDR Fund, ishares U.S. healthcare ETF and First Trust health Care Alpha DEX Fund.
In industrials, the picks are Fidelity MSCI Industrials Index ETF, Vanguard industrials ETF, First Trust Industrials/Producer Durables Alpha Dex Fund, ishares U.S. Industrials ETF, Industrial Select Sector SPDR Fund, and Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Industrials ETF.
Obviously, I’d like to see similar reports for domestically-traded ETFs, but I don’t have access to any at the moment.
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Diversion: “108-Year-Old Calculations by Einstein Sell for $15 Million at Auction” – Gizmodo
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Scott Barlow