Economy. Things are good, and we should be grateful. However, it’s really important to be diversified. Usually when things are this good, they’re not this good for long. The best way to mitigate risk is by being diversified by asset class, geography, and making sure you own the right securities. That is probably going to be the key theme going into 2018 and beyond as we approach the end of the business cycle and start to see more credit build up, not just in the Canadian economy, but economies all over the world. Inflation interest rates are going remain anchored by several structural factors. First and foremost, there is a ton of debt floating around. When you have that much debt in the global economy, rates can only go up so much before it starts causing economic conditions to start deteriorating.

A little concerned about the progress management is going to be able to make as they prune the portfolio trying to right size it. After years of growing by acquisition, focusing on energy and relying on GE Financial, he worries at a stock trading at this price and supposed to generate $1 in earnings. They’ve cut the dividend. There’s a lot of work to be done. It looks like the end markets are struggling. It’s probably going to take several quarters before the turnaround starts to work out. You really want to see organic growth before you get excited. There are better risks/rewards in other industrials.

His outlook for 2018 is that oil and gas prices are going to remain range bound. Would prefer energy infrastructure instead of this company. He wants exposure to companies that are going to benefit from pulling the stuff out of the ground. That includes transporting it, fractionation for gas, logistics. Companies underpinned by “fee for service” or “take or pay” contracts have a lot more visibility and a lot less commodity price exposure. This wouldn’t be his favourite.

Feels you can’t go wrong with this. It is invested in strip centres, not shopping malls. Typically, anchor tenants are grocery stores, banks, etc. which cater to peoples’ every day needs. It is quite sizable and has a decent balance sheet. The concern with REITs is strictly sentiment, as they are considered interest rate sensitive. With this one, he sees a pretty well capitalized company. They have some debt, but are reinvesting in the business. They are looking at redeploying the capital into some development or intensification project which should ultimately cause the net asset value to increase. Dividend yield of 5.6%.

Not a big fan of retailers in general, and this isn’t a good entry point. A better choice would be CT Real Estate Investment Trust (CRT.UN-T), a nominal bond proxy, but you get a decent yield. Canadian Tire is their tenant.

Exceptionally well diversified. He likes management teams who have a history of allocating capital well, good returns on invested capital and a good track record. This company is really the personification of all of that.

He would buy this when it is down. An energy infrastructure company, but doesn’t get credit that a lot of its operating profit is not particularly commodity sensitive. Has great renewable energy contracts, 20-25 years duration, indexed to inflation. On top of that, there is a US acquisition they will be completing next year, which reduces their commodity price exposure even further. Hopefully that causes the stock to get re-rated. Dividend yield of 7.6%.

Trades at a decent valuation. Only about 35% of travel bookings are done online. People still use travel agents. This is a great emerging market story, because as per capital income rises in emerging markets, you are going to see travel spending increasing significantly.

(A Top Pick Nov 23/16. Up 33%.) Involved in a couple of oligopolies, online search, online video and ad spending, and has a ton of cash they can deploy into areas that are going to grow hand over fist in the next decade. It isn’t trading at all that much of a premium to the S&P 500 in the context of its growth rate.

(A Top Pick Nov 23/16. 0%.) A lot of concerns that surround this company are reflected in the valuation. They are in line with where it has been historically. Has a lot of operational room to offset some of the headwinds.

(A Top Pick Nov 23/16. Down 35%.) This is dirt cheap, trading at about 10X earnings. Reduced their guidance because there were some inventory issues at Office Depot and Toys “R” Us. Very well diversified. They’ve merged with Jardin, and going forward are going to be able to get a lot of synergies that ultimately support the earnings growth. Valuation is so compelling that it is tough to make an argument not to pick some up. Dividend yield of 3%.

Sell and buy Enbridge (ENB-T)? You are on the right track. He would get rid of this and buy Enbridge. With energy infrastructure, you are getting very predictable cash flows. It is tough not to like Enbridge considering that it accounts for about two thirds of the oil that crosses over the Canadian and US border. Also has a backlog of over $25 billion that they should be able to execute pretty seamlessly. That translates into mid-single digits/high single digits cash flow growth.

He continues to like this. The demand/supply fundamentals are great. CHMC just released an apartment survey and their outlook for vacancies in major metropolitan city centres are absurdly low in Toronto, Montréal and Ottawa. This one tends to be focused in eastern Canada, and are definitely going to benefit from that low vacancy rate. Also, management spent a ton of money in the last 10 years reinvesting in their properties, allowing them to charge a little more for rent.

Prefers US banks over Canadian banks, as he expects there will be a little more loan growth, especially if you consider that US households have a lot less than Canadian households. This bank has had a fantastic run. It is amongst the large cap banks, so has the most exposure to rising US interest rates.

This bank gives you a huge deposit base in the US. They have an under leveraged deposit base, so they can issue a lot more loans. However, there are still household debt concerns. This would show up through slower loan growth, which probably weighs on earnings growth. He would try to get this on a pullback. Dividend yield of 3.2%.

He really likes management. The dividend is safe. This business grows at about GDP. If they are able to create low cost capacity, they may be able to increase their market share slightly, but the free cash flow yield on this is relatively high. To him, the right price is below $20.

Manulife (MFC-T) or Sun Life (SLF-T)? Insurance companies tend to move up and down with interest rates. If you continue to see the interest rates gradually move up, it will be a positive. ROE’s are decent. Both are benefiting from what is happening in Asia. Both companies are fine.

Manulife (MFC-T) or Sun Life (SLF-T)? Insurance companies tend to move up and down with interest rates. If you continue to see the interest rates gradually move up, it will be a positive. ROE’s are decent. Both are benefiting from what is happening in Asia. Both companies are fine.

A Chinese company is offering to acquire this at $20.37. There is still uncertainty. If you own, he would consider selling some of your holdings.

He likes this company. Very well diversified with a very attractive dividend yield. In recent years they’ve increased their US exposure. It is so well diversified that you can bank on pretty moderate but stable cash flow and cash flow growth for the foreseeable future.

If he owned this, he would switch to Pepsi (PEP-N). There is more optionality with Pepsi. Coca-Cola has re-franchised their bottling agreements. The margins are relatively high. Pepsi is not as operationally efficient, which means that it is probably a better acquisition target.

This business is probably a lot simpler than people think. They sell equipment that allows people to connect to the Internet. This can include routers and switches, and for the longest time this was their bread-and-butter. All of a sudden, we had the advent of software defined networks. Software was decoupled from hardware. Cisco sold them together, so they encountered some margin pressures. Now they have transitioned where you are starting to see some positive organic growth, focused on security. Looking forward, the Internet of things is a whole bunch of different devices connected to the Internet. That’s a lot of data flowing across the networks, which should benefit companies like this. Trading at 12X earnings. Dividend yield of 3%. (Analysts’ price target is $39.)

Valuation is pretty decent, and actually trades at a discount to its US peer group. It is a large player in Canada. Ultimately it should continue to benefit by growing in the US. Has a very decent free cash flow yield. Has a very predictable reoccurring revenue model that will support its earnings growth. (Analysts’ price target is $24.)

Manufactures sensors mostly. Their biggest market is automotive and is starting to get into non-automotive industries and sectors. They will benefit from the Internet of Things as devices become connected with smarter devices that are aware of what is going on. Trading at about 14X earnings. It should demonstrate relatively low organic sales growth, but has great margins and a relatively dominant position. (Analysts’ price target is $53.)

Central Banks.They are forward-looking, so monetary policy to some extent is forward-looking, considering that a lot of Central Banks in the US have hiked rates 3 times since Trump won the presidency. In Canada, the Bank of Canada has hiked rates twice, so we are forward-looking, because inflation isn’t quite at the target a lot of these Central Banks are targeting, which is 2% or below. They think the slack is eventually going to get absorbed and eventually move back up to 2%. Having fixed income in a portfolio is important, because it will act as a ballast and give you an opportunity to redeploy capital when an opportunity presents itself. As long as we have decent credit growth and decent economic growth, it bodes well for owning equities, corporate profits and earnings.

Hold or Sell?If you are holding it, you are buying it. There is no question there is a tremendous amount of growth ahead. It’s very hard to justify valuation. While he has confidence that e-commerce penetration is going to increase very gradually from 9%-10% in the US, when you look at their valuation it is difficult to justify how much earnings are going to have to grow for the valuation to come down to a market multiple. Trades at about 110X next year’s earnings. If you take that market multiple and bring it down to a multiple of about 20, that implies earnings are going to have to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 48% over 10 years. Very few companies have been able to do that.

Key factors you focus on when assessing this kind of company?He tries to look at management, assets, payout ratios and liabilities. When evaluating any REIT, the most important thing is going to be demand and supply. It really affects the ability of management teams to increase occupancy and increase rents. For this one, seniors housing is very operationally intensive, and they benefit from being one of the largest players in Canada. Having national presence gives them the opportunity to purchase things a little cheaper, manage properties more effectively and to increase occupancy in case of a decline. He likes this company. There are very favourable demographic tailwinds that will benefit them going forward.

Valuations are a little more compelling in the context of higher consumer and corporate loan growth. There is also more of a capital redeployment story in the US. This bank has the 5^th largest deposit base in North America. That deposit base, which is under leveraged, represents an opportunity for them to significantly increase loan growth. They should benefit from higher interest rates.

Their asset class is one of the more coveted by institutions, because they are a form of lower income housing. Apartments, versus home ownership, is where a lot of people are migrating as people can’t get approval for mortgages. As a result, there has been significant rental growth in the US market, and homeownership continues to be at a multi-decade low. Hopefully that starts to reverse course, but in the interim, there is a lot of momentum for US apartments. Prefers Equity Residential (EQR-N). Dividend yield of 6%.

There was a strategic review by management for potentially selling the company, but nothing came of that. There was some turnover with the CEO. The big issue is when it initially came to the market, it had very significant exposure to Magna (MG-T), which was their largest tenant. However, it had a pristine balance sheet. When you think of the Debt to Growth Book Value, it had approximately 25%, and the theory was that if they increased the leverage and took that Debt to Growth Book Value to 40%, they would have $1 billion to play with, diversify tenant exposure, make acquisitions. However they haven’t done any of that. That is unfortunate, because real estate prices have gone up significantly. It pays a decent dividend of 5%. His concern is that you really do need the leadership in there.

Versus American banks?He likes US banks versus insurance companies. Banks are in a much better position to deliver earnings growth, versus some of the insurers. Insurers, both in Canada and US, do a little better when interest rates go up. Their liabilities go down and they also get a better return on assets. There is better risk/reward on the banks.

(A Top Pick Sept 20/16. Down 15%.) Continues to like this because it is a relatively defensive asset class, lower income Housing. Western Canada has been particularly challenged given the downturn in energy. The market has been a little overreacting to the downturn. The benefit is that it has a relatively short lease term. Trades at a significant discount to NAV. Continue to Hold if you own. Dividend yield of 5.6%.

(A Top Pick Sept 20/16. Up 43%.) He continues to like the US healthcare sector. In the US, if over 65 years of age, you spend 3X as much on healthcare as under the age of 65. This company doesn’t have much exposure to the Affordable Care Act and is well positioned to benefit from those trends.

(A Top Pick Sept 20/16. Up 11%.) Continues to like this. They generate a pretty decent cash flow, 3%-4% cash flow yield. The balance sheet is relatively strong, however it does continue to own a stake in L’Oreal. If they were to sell that stake, it unlocks a lot of capital which they can use for share buybacks. In the interim, management is focused on slightly improving margins and rationalizing their product line to focus on pet care, water and nutritional products. Derives a significant portion of sales from emerging markets.