High Liner Foods (HLF.TO)

They restructured and got rid of their fleets, and went into processing fish foods. It did extremely well. There was some publicity lately and he feels it is in a bit of a struggle. Just appointed a new CEO.

They were selling breaded fish as their main product and tastes are changing. In the past few months they have come out with a bunch of new products that aren’t breaded. It is the cheapest food processor in the world. The multiple does not make any sense to him. Long term, people will still be consuming more fish and seafood. They are doing a good job of paying down their debt.

A well-managed company. It is unique, but over the last few years seafood sales in the US have struggled. It seems that when the US$ goes up, the price of seafood goes up also. Consumption per capita doesn’t seem to be going up in the US on seafood, even though it is healthier. Thinks it is going to tread water for a while. Not expensive, but quite volatile. You may want to buy when it has a bad quarter.

(A Top Pick March 31/16. Up 23%.) They’ve had a couple of disappointing quarters as their growth projections didn’t quite come to fruition. Dividend yield of 3.1%.

Results were rather disappointing. Their products are not appealing to the health-conscious any more. He would avoid at this time.

(Top Pick Mar 31/16, Up 30.78%) They had disappointing earnings in November, but he bought it right. He got the upside and still owns it. It is a way to play the demand for protein.

High Liner (HLF-T) or Clearwater (CLR-T)? Sold his holdings on this about 3 months ago. Both stocks have had about a 22%-25% haircut in the last 90 days. Both are free cash flow generators, 8.2% for Clearwater and 6.1% for this one. There is $55 million of free cash flow for Clearwater, about 50% more in absolute dollars than on this one. ROE is about the same. The big difference in the coming year, is on the ROE, where it is forecasted to be 21% for this company. In comparison, Clearwater appears to be better value with better growth prospects.

This is a stock that got absolutely killed in 2015, and had a tremendous resurgence last year. In general, he likes the protein stocks. This is inexpensive, and still has an acquisition strategy which it is trying to play out. Good company.

(Market Call Minute.) Even though the price has come off a lot, it has still been a good performer this year. He thinks there are better times ahead. The balance sheet is improving.

There is volatility in this sector. It is because of the rising US dollar. Volumes went down. Take some profits if you are up.

A great company. They’ve had some turbulence in the last couple of years, but to start a company like this from scratch, you would have to spend an awful lot of money. Has a lot of assets that are difficult to replicate. A great company to own over the long-term. Trading at about 14X earnings, so pretty reasonably priced.

(A Top Pick Sept 3/15. Up 55.22%.) This has only done well because it did so poorly in 2015. The valuation on this company is dirt, dirt cheap. He still sees a lot more value in this. Still a Buy.

Surprised everyone by coming out with some excellent earnings. They’ve made considerable progress in several areas. Have about 5 things working for them all at once. Made a tremendous transition from fishing on the east coast to value-added processing in the North American market. They supply about 10% of the US market and 50% of the Canadian market.

They are selling a component of their business. Stock was up today, but he thinks there is a couple of dollars left. There are about 3 analysts covering this, and you might get an upgrade tomorrow.

Had a long upward move from 2011 until it reached the peak at the beginning of 2015. It then broke down, and it is now trying to form some kind of a base. It broke above its pivot point and he thinks it will come down to test and then continue upwards.