Everyone has heard of Walt Disney. It’s an international family entertainment and media giant that owns businesses ranging from the ABC television network to Disneyland. Its subsidiaries include Walt Disney Studies, Pixar Animation, LucasFilm Ltd. (the Star Wars franchise), Marvel, Touchstone Pictures, the Disney Store, and much more. The company is headquartered in Burbank, California.
Category: Picks
DocuSign (NDQ: DOCU)
The concept behind DocuSign is simple. As more employees work from home, it is necessary for documents to still get signed whether it be for mortgages, divorces, corporate affairs, etc.
Pfizer is one of America’s largest pharmaceutical companies.
IShares U.S. Treasury Bond ETF (BZX: GOVT)
This ETF invests exclusively in U.S. Treasury bonds, with maturities from one to 30 years.
This is a high-quality minimum rate reset preferred.
Canadian Solar (NDQ: CSIQ)
Canadian Solar is based in Guelph, Ontario and is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of solar panels. It sells the panels as part of turnkey solar power plants. The company was founded in 2001 and has been public since 2006. It employs13,000 people in 24 countries. Most of its manufacturing facilities are in Canada […]
GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE: GSK)
Glaxo, as GSK is commonly known, is one of the ten largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Its particular strengths are in asthma/respiratory, HIV, and vaccines. It has the largest global over-the-counter (OTC) consumer healthcare division.
Gilead Sciences (NDQ: GILD)
Gilead is an American biotechnology company that researches, develops and commercializes drugs. The company focuses primarily on antiviral drugs used in the treatment of HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and influenza.
Richards specializes in servicing small- and medium-sized companies, offering glass and plastic manufacturing and distribution services. The company is well diversified, with 48% of revenue from food and beverage and other manufacturing, 29% from cosmetics, and 23% from healthcare. Geographically, 60% of its sales are in the U.S. and 40% in Canada.
China Mobile (NYSE: CHL)
China Mobile is the leading telecommunications services provider in Mainland China, operating throughout the country and in Hong Kong. It claims to have the world’s largest network and customer base, with over 1.6 billion subscribers.
These preferreds were first issued in 2003 at $25.50. At the time, they paid a quarterly dividend of $0.34625 ($1.385 per year) to yield 5.4%. The dividend is reset every five years at not less than 80% of the five-year Government of Canada bond yield.
iShares Global REIT ETF (NYSE: REET)
this ETF provides international REIT exposure.
This ETF invests in units of its U.S. counterpart.
This ETF invests in U.S. dollar-denominated government bonds from emerging market issuers by including up to three bonds per country. The U.S. dollar exposure is hedged back to Canadian dollars.
The goal of this ETF is to track the performance of the broad U.S. bond index, net of fees and expenses and hedged to the Canadian dollar.
Morguard REIT (TSX: MRT.UN, OTC: MGRUF)
These are real estate investment trust units traded on the TSX, with market cap of about $700 million, and over 60 million shares outstanding, which ensures plenty of liquidity.
A core holding for income seekers.
This actively managed ETF aims to provide regular dividend income and modest long-term capital growth by investing in some of the world’s best dividend paying stocks. It is sub-advised by Guardian Capital.
Horizons Active Cdn Dividend ETF (TSX: HAL)
This is an actively managed ETF that invests in a portfolio of North American securities (mainly Canadian) that pay above-average dividends.
This ETF provides exposure to Europe’s leading financial institutions.
Restaurant Brands is the third-largest global fast-food company with operations in more than 100 countries. It has 31,000 stores, of which 65% are Burger Kings, 18% are Tim Hortons, and 13% are Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen locations. The remainder are Firehouse Subs.
YUM! Brands Inc. (NYSE: YUM)
Yum! Brands is the holding company that owns Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC), and Pizza Hut. It is the second largest global fast-food chain and is about half as big as McDonald’s by revenue. It has 57,000 restaurants in 290 countries with almost half of its revenue coming from the US. China is its […]
This ETF is based on the 100 largest listed companies in the FTSE 100 Index.
Atlantica is a London-based sustainable company that owns a diversified portfolio of renewable energy, efficient natural gas, electric transmission, and water assets in North and South America, and certain markets in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA).
Alexandria is a specialty REIT that develops laboratories, medical offices, and related space that caters to the life sciences. It tends to cluster around universities, which gives its customers access to skilled labour and the entrepreneurial spinoffs that come from academic research.
Digital Realty Trust (NYSE: DLR)
DLR specializes in cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things
This preferred has a non-investment grade rating so is therefore higher risk.
This preferred is investment-grade level (barely) and is rated Pfd-2L.
Polaris Renewable Energy (TSX: PIF)
Polaris is engaged in the operation, acquisition and development of renewable energy projects in Latin America. Currently, the company operates San Jacinto, a 72MW geothermal project located in Nicaragua, and a 5MW run-of-river project in Peru. The company is completing the construction of another 28MW of run-of-river projects, also located in Peru.
Global X SuperDividend REIT ETF (NDQ: SRET)
This ETF invests in 30 of the highest yielding REITs in the world. The overwhelming majority of these (87%) are in the U.S., with the rest spread among France, Australia, and the Netherlands.
Chegg Inc. (NYSE: CHGG)
Chegg provides services and textbook rentals to students throughout America.
This fund seeks to track the FTSE World Government Bond Index, hedged back to Canadian dollars.
Fiera Capital (TSX: FSZ, OTC: FRRPF)
Fiera Capital is one of the top three independent asset managers in Canada and one of the top 70 in North America with $174.5 billion in assets under management (AUM) as of March 31.
VXX provides exposure to a daily rolling long position in the first and second month VIX futures contracts and reflects views of the future direction of the VIX index at the time of expiration of the contracts comprising the Index.
United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS)
UPS is the world’s largest package delivery company, with a market capitalization of US$87.6 billion. It operates in 220 countries and territories and employs 481,000 people. Its operations include a cargo airline, freight-based trucking, and 5,000 franchised UPS stores. In 2018, it had net income of US$4.79 billion and revenues of US$71.8 billion.
This ETF provides exposure to a portfolio of equities from quality companies with active share buyback programs that have significantly and consistently reduced their outstanding share count. The fund replicates, to the extent possible, the performance of the CIBC Canadian Buyback Index. It uses a proprietary rules-based methodology to select TSX-traded securities that meet minimum […]

Precious metals are considered safe havens during a recession.
The second-largest producing silver miner in North America.
Medtronic plc (NYSE: MDT)
Medtronic was founded in Minneapolis in 1949 as a medical equipment repair company. It is now the world’s largest medical device company, headquartered for tax reasons in Dublin. It gets 60% of its sales and profits outside the U.S. and employs 86,000 people in 140 countries. More than 10% of its employees are research scientists, […]
This is the smallest of the big five Canadian banks but also the highest yield among the group.
VanEck Vectors Vietnam ETF (NYSE: VNM)
This ETF holds a market cap-weighted portfolio of Vietnamese stocks. This fund covers approximately 70% of the companies listed in Vietnam. The rest are international firms that generate a majority of the revenues in Vietnam.
Viemed Healthcare Inc. (TSX, NDQ: VMD)
Viemed, through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Sleep Management and Home Sleep, is a participating Medicare durable medical equipment supplier that provides post-acute respiratory care services in the United States.
Canadian Utilities (TSX: CU, OTC: CDUAF)
Canadian Utilities is based in Calgary. Its operations include electricity generation, transmission, and distribution and natural gas transmission, distribution, and infrastructure development. It also provides energy storage and industrial water solutions and has been heavily investing in green energy projects for over 20 years. CU’s main operations are in Alberta, but it also has natural […]
AltaGas Canada (TSX: ACI)
AltaGas Canada was spun off from its parent AltaGas in October 2018 as part of the latter’s debt reduction program after it doubled its size by acquiring U.S. utility WGL. AltaGas retains a 36.8% stake in ACI. ACI owns or operates regulated natural gas utilities in three provinces (Alberta, B.C., and Nova Scotia) with 130,000 […]
Aritzia is an innovative design house and fashion retailer catering to women.
Arista Networks Inc. (NDQ: ANET)
Arista Networks is a pioneer in software-driven, cognitive cloud networking for large-scale datacenter and campus environments.
Ericsson (NDQ: ERIC)
Swedish-based Ericsson (the legal name is Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson) is one of the world leaders in 5G technology.
Apple Covered Call
This ETF invests in a portfolio of low-beta-rated Canadian stocks. Beta is a measure of a stock’s sensitivity to broad market movements. The lower the beta, the less sensitive a stock is to big up-and-down swings, and thus to unusually large gains or losses.
This ETF was launched in 2007 and holds 86 global stocks in the transportation, communication, water, and electricity services sectors. Five Canadian energy firms are included in the holdings.