As the third-largest school bus transportation provider in North America, Student Transportation Inc (TSX: STB, NSDQ: STB) has an intriguing story and an enticing 8.5 percent yield that has attracted substantial support from income-hungry retail investors. Nevertheless, it’s worth scrutinizing how such a small company–its CAD582.5 million market capitalization puts it toward the lower-end of the small-cap range–can support such a sizable payout.
To be sure, Student Transportation has been the very model of dividend consistency, paying a monthly dividend for 104 consecutive months, since February 2005. And the company is pursuing a consolidation strategy in a highly fragmented industry, with a tailwind from an era of tighter government budgets, where cash-strapped school districts are anxious to save money by outsourcing their transportation services.
As part of its roll-up strategy, Student Transportation has steadily acquired local school bus operators–mostly in the US, where the Canadian firm derives the vast majority of its revenue–in an extended acquisition spree over the past several years, though the pace of its M&A has slowed more recently. According to data provided by both the company and Bloomberg, Student Transportation has closed 31 acquisitions since 2004, including 23 since 2008 and eight in calendar-year 2011 alone. Included in this tally is the latest set of acquisitions, announced on Sept. 17, of two school bus companies, one in New Jersey and the other in Pennsylvania.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Goldman Sachs Group Inc.(The)
The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides investment banking, securities, and investment management services to corporations, financial institutions, governments, and high-net-worth individuals worldwide. Its Investment Banking segment offers financial advisory, including advisory assignments with respect to mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, corporate defense, risk management, restructurings, and spin-offs; and underwriting securities, loans and other financial instruments, and derivative transactions. The company?s Institutional Client Services segment provides client execution activities, such as fixed income, currency, and commodities client execution related to making markets in interest rate products, credit products, mortgages, currencies, and commodities; and equities related to making markets in equity products, as well as commissions and fees from executing and clearing institutional client transactions on stock, options, and fu tures exchanges. This segment also engages in the securities services business providing financing, securities lending, and other prime brokerage services to institutional clients, including hedge funds, mutual funds, pension funds, and foundations. Its Investing and Lending segment invests in debt securities, loans, public and private equity securities, real estate, consolidated investment entities, and power generation facilities. This segment also involves in the origination of loans to provide financing to clients. The company?s Investment Management segment provides investment management services and investment products to institutional and individual clients. This segment also offers wealth advisory services, including portfolio management and financial counseling, and brokerage and other transaction services to high-net-worth individuals and families. In addition, it provides global investment research services. The company was founded in 1869 and is headquartered in New York, New York.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior S.A. (BLX)
Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. provides trade financing to commercial banks, middle-market companies, and corporations primarily in Latin America and the Caribbean. The company operates in three segments: Commercial, Treasury, and Asset Management. The Commercial segment offers deposits and loans for foreign trade transactions. This segment also provides various products, services, and solutions relating to foreign trade, which include co-financing arrangements, underwriting of syndicated credit facilities, structured trade financing, asset-based financing in the form of factoring, vendor financing and leasing, and other fee-based services, such as electronic clearing services. The Treasury segment offers liquidity management and investment securities activities, including management of interest rate, liquidity, price, and currency risks. The Asset Management segment provides asset management services, including investment advisory services for funds and managed accounts. This division is involved in trading foreign exchange, interest rate swaps, and derivative products. The company was formerly known as Banco Latinoamericano de Exportaciones, S.A. and changed its name to Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. in June 2009. Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. was founded in 1977 and is headquartered in Panama City, the Republic of Panama.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Eric Volkman]
Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior (NYSE: BLX ) , better and more conveniently known as Bladex, is maintaining its dividend policy. The lender has declared a payout of $0.30 per share of its stock for its Q1, to be paid on May 7 to shareholders of record as of April 29. This amount matches the company's previous disbursement, which has been paid in both of the preceding two quarters. Before that, Bladex dispensed $0.25 per share.
- [By Rich Duprey]
Panama-based supranational bank�Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior� (NYSE: BLX ) announced yesterday its second-quarter dividend of $0.30 per share, the same rate it's paid for the past three quarters after raising the payout 20% from $0.25 per share.
Top 5 Clean Energy Companies To Invest In 2014: AmerisourceBergen Corporation (HOLDING CO)
AmerisourceBergen Corporation, a pharmaceutical services company, provides drug distribution and related services to healthcare providers and pharmaceutical manufacturers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada. The company distributes brand-name and generic pharmaceuticals, over-the-counter healthcare products, home healthcare supplies and equipment, and related services to various healthcare providers, including acute care hospitals and health systems, independent and chain retail pharmacies, mail order pharmacies, medical and dialysis clinics, physicians, and long-term care and other alternate site pharmacies. It also offers various services, such as pharmaceutical packaging, pharmacy automation, inventory management, reimbursement and pharmaceutical consulting and staffing services, logistics services, and pharmacy management. In addition, AmerisourceBergen provides scalable automated pharmacy dispensing equipment, medication and supply dispensing cabinets , and supply management software to various retail and institutional healthcare providers. Further, the company offers distribution and other services to physicians, who specialize in various disease states; distributes plasma and other blood products, injectible pharmaceuticals, and vaccines; and provides drug commercialization, third party logistics, reimbursement consulting, data analytics, and outcomes research services for biotech and other pharmaceutical manufacturers, as well as practice management and group purchasing services for physician practices. Additionally, it delivers unit dose, punch card, unit-of-use, and other packaging solutions to institutional and retail healthcare providers; and offers contract packaging and clinical trial material services for pharmaceutical manufacturers. The company serves customers through a network of distribution and service centers, and packaging facilities. AmerisourceBergen was founded in 1985 and is headquartered in Chesterb rook, Pennsylvania.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Higher One Holdings Inc.(ONE)
Higher One Holdings, Inc. provides technology and payment services in the United States. It offers a suite of disbursement and payment solutions for higher education institutions and their students. The company provides OneDisburse Refund Management product that offers higher education institutional clients with a technology service for streamlining the student refund disbursement process. It also offers CASHNet Payment suite that includes software-as-a-service products and services, such as ePayment to securely accept online payments for tuition, charges, and fees from students through credit card, pinless debit, and ACH; eBill to automate payer billing and processing functions; MyPaymentPlan to personalize students? payment plans; eMarket that allows academic, athletic, and other departments to take alumni donations, sell event tickets and other merchandise, and accept payments of event and conference registration fees; and Cashiering to operate and manage cashiering fu nctions, back office payments, and campus-wide departmental deposits. In addition, the company provides OneDisburse ID, which offers an option to combine the company?s debit card with the institution?s ID cards; OneDisburse Payroll to distribute payroll and other employee-related payments; OneDisburse PLUS product to distribute Parent PLUS loan refunds to parents on behalf of the school; and Financial Intelligence to students with an online class. Further, it provides student-oriented banking services to campus communities. Additionally, the company offers OneAccount product for students, as well as faculty, staff, and alumni, with an FDIC-insured online checking account and a debit MasterCard ATM card. Higher One Holdings, Inc. was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in New Haven, Connecticut.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Roberto Pedone]
One under-$10 business services player that looks poised for a run higher is Higher One (ONE), which provides technology-based refund disbursement, payment processing and data analytics services to higher education institutions and students. It also provides banking services to campus communities. This stock has been hit hard by the bears so far in 2013, with shares down by 26%.
If you take a look at the chart for Higher One, you'll notice that this stock has been downtrending badly for the last three months, with shares plunging from its high of $11.93 to its recent low of $6.97 a share. During that downtrend, shares of ONE were consistently making lower highs and lower lows, which is bearish technical price action. That said, shares of ONE have recently formed a double bottom chart pattern at $7.05 to $6.97 a share. This stock has now started to rebound sharply off that double bottom and move within range of triggering a near-term breakout trade.
Traders should now look for long-biased trades in ONE if it manages to break out above some near-term overhead resistance at $7.85 a share and then once it clears its 50-day moving average at $8.11 a share with high volume. Look for a sustained move or close above those levels with volume that hits near or above its three-month average action of 196,360 shares. If that breakout triggers soon, then ONE will set up to re-test or possibly take out its next major overhead resistance levels at $9 to its 200-day moving average of $9.77 a share. This stock could even tag $11 a share if that 200-day gets taken out with volume.
Traders can look to buy ONE off weakness to anticipate that breakout and simply use a stop that sits right below some key near-term support at $7.39 a share, or below $7 a share. One can also buy ONE off strength once it takes out those breakout levels with volume and then simply use a stop that sits a comfortable percentage from your entry point.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Gildan Activewear Inc.(GIL)
Gildan Activewear Inc. engages in the manufacture and sale of apparel products primarily in the United States, Canada, and Europe. It sells T-shirts, fleece, and sport shirts to wholesale distributors under the Gildan brand name. The company also provides its activewear products for work and school uniforms and athletic team wear, and other purposes to convey individual, group, and team identity. In addition, it offers undecorated products to branded apparel companies and retailers; and underwear products. Further, the company markets its sock products under the various brands, including Gold Toe, PowerSox, SilverToe, Auro, All Pro, GT, and the Gildan brand. The company was formerly known as Textiles Gildan Inc. and changed its name to Gildan Activewear Inc. in March 1995. Gildan Activewear Inc. was founded in 1984 and is headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Eric Volkman]
Gildan Activewear (NYSE: GIL ) just bought itself a new wardrobe. The company announced it has acquired "substantially all of the assets" of privately held screen printing and apparel decoration specialist New Buffalo Shirt Factory for around $7 million.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Enbridge Inc(ENB)
Enbridge Inc. engages in the transportation and distribution of crude oil and natural gas primarily in Canada and the United States. Its Liquids Pipelines segment operates common carrier and contract crude oil, natural gas liquids (NGLs), and refined products pipelines and terminals. The company?s Gas Distribution segment distributes natural gas to residential, commercial, and industrial customers primarily in central and eastern Ontario, northern New York State, Quebec, and New Brunswick. Enbridge?s Gas Pipelines, Processing and Energy Services segment invests in natural gas pipelines, processing and green energy projects, and commodity marketing businesses, as well as performs commodity storage, transport, and supply management services. Its Sponsored Investments segment transports crude oil and other liquid hydrocarbons through common carrier and feeder pipelines, as well as transports, gathers, processes, and markets natural gas and NGLs; operates a crude oil and liqui ds pipeline and gathering system; and owns a 50% interest in the Canadian portion of Alliance Pipeline and partial interests in various green energy investments. The company was formerly known as IPL Energy Inc. and changed its name to Enbridge Inc. in October 1998. Enbridge Inc. was founded in 1949 and is headquartered in Calgary, Canada.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Arjun Sreekumar]
If constructed, Keystone would transport up to 830,000 barrels per day of crude oil from Alberta's oil sands to Steele City, Neb. From Nebraska, the crude would make its way to Cushing, Okla., from where it would be moved south via Seaway, a major pipeline that runs from Cushing to refineries along the Gulf Coast and is operated jointly by Enbridge (NYSE: ENB ) and Enterprise Products Partners (NYSE: EPD ) .
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Stage Stores Inc.(SSI)
Stage Stores, Inc. operates as a specialty department store retailer that offers branded and private label apparel, accessories, cosmetics, and footwear for women, men, and children in the United States. The company also offers sportswear, dresses, intimates, home and gift products, outerwear, swimwear, and other products. It primarily focuses on consumers in small and mid-sized markets. The company operates stores under the names of Bealls, Goody?s, Palais Royal, Peebles, and Stage. Stage Stores, Inc. also sells its products through its Web site. As of March 06, 2012, it operated 819 stores in 40 states. Stage Stores, Inc. is headquartered in Houston, Texas.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Dan Caplinger]
On Friday, Stage Stores (NYSE: SSI ) will release its latest quarterly results. The key to making smart investment decisions on stocks reporting earnings is to anticipate how they'll do before they announce results, leaving you fully prepared to respond quickly to whatever inevitable surprises arise. That way, you'll be less likely to make an uninformed knee-jerk reaction to news that turns out to be exactly the wrong move.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Information Services Group Inc.(III)
Information Services Group, Inc. operates as a fact-based sourcing advisory company principally in the Americas, Europe, and the Asia Pacific. It provides strategic consulting, benchmarking and analytics, managed services, and research services with a focus on information technology, business process transformation, and enterprise resource planning. The company serves financial services, telecom, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, transportation and travel, and energy and utilities industries; and state and local governments and airport and transit authorities. Information Services Group, Inc. was founded in 2006 and is based in Stamford, Connecticut.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: Windstream Corporation(WIN)
Windstream Corporation provides communications and technology solutions in the United States. The company offers various solutions, including IP-based voice and data services, multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) networking, data center and managed services, hosting services, and communications systems to businesses and government agencies. It also provides high-speed Internet, voice, and digital television services to residential customers primarily located in rural areas. The company?s data services include data center and managed hosting, MPLS networking, and dedicated access, as well as high-speed Internet to business customers; integrated solutions consist of multiple voice and data services delivered over an IP connection; voice services comprise local and long distance, call waiting, caller identification, and voicemail; and special access services include point-to-point switching arrangements for voice and data traffic. In addition, it provides wholesale services, which primarily include voice and data services on a wholesale basis to other carriers; usage sensitive services to long distance companies; and other local exchange carriers for access to the network in connection with the completion of long-distance calls, as well as reciprocal compensation received from wireless and other local connecting carriers for the use of its facilities. As of June 30, 2011, the company served approximately 3.3 million access lines, 1.3 million high-speed Internet customers, and operated approximately 60,000 fiber route miles. Windstream Corporation is based in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Selena Maranjian]
Pay attention to payout ratios
It's smart to examine a company's payout ratio, too. That measures the percentage of its earnings that it's paying out in dividends. Clearly, a company paying out more than 100% of its earnings for a protracted period is not in a sustainable situation. Telecom company Windstream (NASDAQ: WIN ) , for example, sports a fetching dividend yield above 11%, but its actual annual dividend of $1.00 annually is worrisome, given its trailing 12 months of earnings per share of just $0.28. Sure, earnings can rise and make this less worrisome, but it's definitely a red flag worth considering. Bulls are hopeful about its acquisitions, but it also carries a lot of debt. - [By Dan Caplinger]
For years, investors turned to lesser-known telecom companies for high dividend yields. Windstream (NASDAQ: WIN ) and Frontier Communications (NASDAQ: FTR ) became especially popular, as they focused on rural areas where consumers have fewer choices on where to get telecom services. Even though those businesses have been in slow decline, both Frontier and Windstream have made efforts to broaden their offerings to keep up with competition in broadband Internet and business services, with varying degrees of success. Windstream has managed to keep its dividend steady, but Frontier had to cut its dividend twice in recent years, sending its shares down substantially.
Top 10 Canadian Companies To Buy Right Now: United States Steel Corporation(X)
United States Steel Corporation produces and sells steel mill products in North America and Central Europe. It operates in three segments: Flat-rolled Products (Flat-rolled), U. S. Steel Europe (USSE), and Tubular Products (Tubular). The Flat-rolled segment offers slabs, rounds, strip mill plates, sheets, and tin mill products, as well as iron ore and coke. This segment serves service center, conversion, transportation, construction, container, and appliance and electrical markets in North America. The USSE segment offers slabs, sheets, strip mill plates, tin mill products, and spiral welded pipes, as well as heating radiators and refractory ceramic materials. This segment serves the European construction, service center, conversion, container, transportation, and appliance and electrical, as well as and oil, gas, and petrochemical markets. The Tubular segment offers seamless and electric resistance welded steel casing and tubing; and standard, and line pipe and mechanical tubing. It primarily serves customers in the oil, gas, and petrochemical markets. The company also provides transportation services, including railroad and barge operations. In addition, it owns, develops, and manages various real estate assets, which include approximately 200,000 acres of surface rights primarily in Alabama, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania; participates in joint ventures that are developing real estate projects in Alabama, Maryland, and Illinois; and owns approximately 4,000 acres of land in Ontario, Canada. The company was founded in 1901 and is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Advisors' Opinion:- [By Dan Caplinger]
Materials have posted the weakest performance, just barely eking out a gain on the year, with technology and energy also falling behind the overall return of the S&P 500. For materials, the slowdown in China has sent commodity producers of all kinds for a loop. In particular, with slower construction activity, U.S. Steel (NYSE: X ) and other steel companies have seen their stocks tumble throughout 2013. That in turn has caused a cascade effect, as coal and iron-ore supplier Cliffs Natural Resources (NYSE: CLF ) has seen less demand for its vital inputs for the steel-making process. Gold's big decline last week only hurt matters by sending precious-metals miners down for the count as well.
- [By Jayson Derrick]
Wells Fargo downgraded two steel stocks this morning due to increasing amounts of cheaper imports that have been flooding the market. U.S. Steel (NYSE: X) and Nucor (NYSE: NUE) were downgraded to a $17 to $21 range and a $50 to $55 range respectively. U.S. Steel lost 2.98 percent for the day closing at $26.34 while Nucor lost 2.05 percent, closing at $51.96.
- [By Dan Caplinger]
U.S. Steel (NYSE: X ) , short position: 29.4% of float and 29.3% of outstanding shares
The steel industry has struggled for a long time, and the continuing sluggishness in Chinese growth has led to major questions about how long investors may have to wait before demand for steel, along with the related commodities that go into producing it, starts to rise. Even with the shares at levels below their 2009 financial-crisis lows, U.S. Steel still has short-sellers believing the stock can fall lower still.
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