Stephen Takacsy, B. Eng, MBAManitoba Telecom ServicesMBT.TOHOLDJan 21, 2014

Being acquired by Bell Canada (BCE-T). Accept the offer or just take the cash? You might as well wait for the tender offer and get the full price. If you already own BCE, you may not want to take shares, but take the cash instead. At current levels with a 5% yield, BCE is decent.

Bell (BCE-T) is offering $40, but this is currently trading on the market for about $38. This is a good company at a good price, and he hopes that they hold out to get a little bit higher.

Trading at a bit of discount to what BCE had offered for the company. Expects there will be more and more consolidation in this industry. He doesn’t think there is a lot of risk to the deal not being approved.

This got bought by Bell Canada (BCE-T), but it wasn’t a great company as they had a lot of issues. If they had stayed on that path, they would have probably had to cut their dividends. Keep the Bell shares, as it is a great company, has a great dividend and continues to perform well.

This is being taken out by BCE (BCE-T), and if you own, you might as well sell at this point.

The dividend should be paid until the deal closes. It looks like the deal is accretive to BCE-T. It has been incredibly well managed.

There are three reasons it is trading below the offer price. You have a time value until it closes; there is the uncertainty of the regulators (3 have to approve this); and it is based on where BCE-T is trading when the deal closes, so you may not get the $40 offer price. He would sell it and let someone else have the uncertainty.

A really good space to be in. Thinks it has surprised a lot of people. From a technical basis he has a $55 target. Has been pretty volatile as they have worked through some earnings. Ranks really well.

There is thinking that this will eventually get swallowed up by one of the larger telcos. The new management has done a fairly good job of restructuring and cutting costs. While you are waiting for it to be taken over, it has a decent dividend, and she doesn’t see anything negative on the horizon. It should do okay in a volatile market.

Because he considers this to be a utility stock, utility stocks normally do very well in the summertime. Technically it looks very good. Recently broke to a new high. It’s in an upward trend and is outperforming the Canadian market and is above its 20 day moving average. RSIs are positive. A very attractive situation.

Dividend is probably more stable now that they are offloading their Allstream division. One of the problems is that they are keeping a fair amount of the pension liability on their books, even after the sale. Not a bad company, post this divestiture. Good yield which he thinks is safe. A good valuation on EBITDA.

He would buy one of the other large telcos instead. This one is a very constrained company, and it is very hard to see how it is going to grow. You are going to do better with Bell (BCE-T), Telus (T-T) or Shaw (SJR.B-T).

The dividend is safe because they just cut it. It is still at a high payout ratio. Allstream is for sale, but they have to find a buyer. If they get rid of it, then the remaining company will probably get taken out.

Has cut its dividend about 2 or 3 times since it went public, so it is a company that is not growing. It’s doing its best to maintain its share in Manitoba. A cheap stock, but it wouldn’t fit his metrics for a quality growing dividend.

He is not sure BCE-T would take them over. He thinks what is happening with Allstream is baked into the price.