AT&T (T)

AT&T (T-N) or Orange (ORAN-N)? He doesn’t know about AT&T, but Orange he does know well and is maintaining his $28 target.

Sell now for the FX benefit and move into a Canadian stock? Their intent now is to capture distribution. He doesn’t see any problem with continuing to Hold this. It is probably underpriced and a little bit misunderstood in terms of what they are intending to be in the future. Yield of 5.6%.

Switching from BCE to AT&T? US telcos look a lot cheaper than Canadian telcos in valuation, but they haven’t done anything, and he doesn’t know why that is. He is going to spend some time researching the US telcos. Why would you give up your Canadian telco for a US telco? You are giving up the Canadian dividend tax credit. It is essentially a monopoly business in Canada.

AT&T (T-N) or BCE (BCE-T) for dividends? Although they are both mega names in the telco space, they are quite different, primarily because the telco space in the US is much more competitive, which means price wars. Margins are much thinner in the US. This company’s share price, since about mid-2012, has really done nothing. He would sell this and buy BCE.

Likes the US telecom sector right now. For all the noise around the whole market with risk, the telecom sector just continues to deliver. Growth is not what it used to be, but valuation is very cheap. Good dividend yield and good valuation.

The US telecom space is a lot more competitive than in Canada. The Canadian telecoms have great positioning since there is a lack of competition and they pay a good dividend which you get a tax credit for.

Vodafone (VOD-Q) or AT&T (T-N)? If you are looking for global exposure, he would suggest Vodafone.

AT&T (T-N) or Verizon (VZ-N)? He tends to err on the side of caution, so he would prefer this one. It is the more stable side of the business. Also, pays a higher dividend.

This scores tops in terms of stability, and has a reasonable ROE. Price to free cash flow is not cheap, which is generally true for telcos, but they are very stable businesses. They can carry more debt and typically pay a good yield. Dividend yield of 5.8%. If you are looking for a place to hide, this would be a great place.

If looking for safety and stability, this is not a bad place to go. If looking for growth, he is not convinced that you are going to see it in this. Looking at the large US telcos, it is so darn competitive and there are major price wars between this company and Verizon (VZ-N), and what they are doing is cutting costs and fees on the various plans to remain competitive. A very challenging environment. The good news is you are getting a fat dividend, but if you are looking for share price appreciation he would prefer Canadian names. (See Top Picks.)

This pays you much more than the US treasury bond does. Also, likes it because it is a defensive type of investment. Feels the dividend is reasonably safe, but it is dealing in a very, very competitive world. There is a lot of debt involved. 10% dividend yield.

This one and Verizon dominate the US market. He used to be there but got out. Lots of money has to be spent where the company may or may not get a return on it. The big dividend stocks are vulnerable if and when rates start to go up. It is okay but he would not rush out to buy it.

A decent income exposure. As new phones come out data packages go up all the time. As investors we have to watch out here for interest rates. Their growth should be okay here from an investor standpoint. From a tax perspective, owning Canadian telcos would be better.

She doesn’t own any telecom stocks. This is a mature market and has a stable earnings stream. The growth is really coming from wireless, because wire line is declining. She thinks penetration is pretty high for smart phones in the US. They have attractive yields because they have a steady stream of cash flow. She would prefer Verizon (VZ-N) because it is more wireless. If you own, consider taking your US money out of this and putting it into something like Telus (T-T) to take advantage of the US$.

If you believe in continued growth of the US economy, this is the biggest telecom company effectively. Had some issues relative to Verizon because they did not have the iPhone. Verizon is now saddled with the debt associated with the acquisition of the Vodafone wireless piece. Longer-term, the movement for the US telcos is that as they raise interest rates, as pension funds need to be constantly funded, it will cause the pension deficits to be less of a negative to a positive, and we might even see a situation where there is a pension funding holiday. The US will be the first to experience that, and when that occurs, there will be some decreases in costs and may actually result in a higher growth for the earnings stream.