Thomson Reuters Corp (TRI.TO)

Has had the best year in about a decade. If you own, you are just kind of breaking even after 10 years. This last year was the good year. He would think the low hanging fruit has been picked now. It is a very difficult area. There is so much content on the Internet and so much of it is free. Also, they are against a very formidable competitor in Bloomberg. He owns some of their bonds.

(A Top Pick Jan 10/14. Up 13.11%.) Sold his holdings because there were other stocks in his portfolio that had been beaten up, and this was considered a safe company, which the market was bidding up. A great company and there is a good margin story, but not a good revenue story now.

A reasonably good entry point. Energy in the Canadian sector is off about 7% in the last 2 months. That reflects that the WTI, the North American benchmark, has weakened quite a bit. In general, the Canadian market is a gas market for drillers and you are coming into the historically strong period from October to March. This company has a relatively new fleet relative to most of its competition.

Beginning to see some margin expansion. The recent quarter wasn’t so much about revenues being ahead, but that the earnings themselves were expanding. We are seeing good cost control and some sales growth in the financial and risk area. Legal area still tends to do very well. We are finally seeing the ROE expanding along with the margins. We could see a few more dollars in this. He would be looking at taking some profits at around $44-$45.

A serial underperformer of the last 5 years. 4% dividend and they generate a lot of free cash flow. The story is their new Icon platform. It will be a master platform for all other platforms allowing them to get out of a lot of legacy costs. Their service is cheaper than Bloomberg. They are selling a lot of the systems.

Owns this in his income portfolio. Earnings were in line, but not anything super spectacular. Expects to continue to see this business grow. As capital markets and the economy pick up, there is a migration from one of their services to a newer one that has higher revenues and higher margins.

They failed being able to compete with Bloomberg as originally planned. She didn’t like their products, and is a reason why it is down so much. Potential here, but you are taking a risk on execution.

Does not expect a dividend increase here. Financial and risk area is the biggest business for them right now. As financial services has recovered, TRI-T has been gaining some market share. About 26% of revenues come from legal so now that we see more M&A activity, this area should be stronger as well. They should continue to improve going forward. If it got close to $40 he would take profits.

Sold his holdings at about $38. They were having a lot of trouble integrating Reuters, which was going much slower than expected. If just looking for yield this is okay. Growth looks like it is going to be a little better going forward. Would still want something in the low $37-$36 to make enough of a return to make it a Buy. It is currently on his watch list.

Valuation is fair, but not really compelling. You could end up with a little bit of upside, but this is really completely predicated upon the turnaround of the financials services business. This has been the one part of their business that has been lagging in the last couple of years. He wouldn’t own it here, but does think the dividend is safe.

Not as bullish right now on this one. It is more expensive and the Reuters acquisition is so dependent on the financial industry. This is slower growth, although safe dividend. It would not be his top pick for growth going forward.

Have consistently grown their dividend a little bit. A good company in terms of 85% of its recurring revenue. The trouble he has with this is that growth always seems to be coming next year. Have done a lot of cost-cutting. Had some product misses, specifically in the financial side and are also suffering from the financial side contracting a little.

Preferred B Series II. This is sort of an old-style where it trades off the prime rate. If the primary goes up this will go up. Trades on the par value of $25, 70% of prime. Pays a dividend of about $0.52 per share. That could grow if rates go up. Was trading as high as $24 plus and is now down to $17.58. Really good value.

If you are income oriented, they should be okay. You can never get this stock cheap. If you are long term, then you should be very well served.

Most of the large investments and banks globally subscribe to this in one form or another. Very smart in that they own a big chunk of the legal businesses. Have been able to diversify their professional information services to a great extent. Took a big bet on the revamp of the financial services which has not gone as smoothly as had been hoped. At the current price, he is actually wondering where he is going to sell his holdings because it has come up a fair amount in the last year or so. It’s beginning to reflect full value.