Optimism #84 - March 7, 2025

Dear clients and friends,

It’s a mess out there, but there were nice share price rebounds Monday and Friday last week.
My suspicion is that it’s premature optimism, or what the seasoned market people call a ‘dead cat bounce’.  Sorry to cat lovers.
Years from now we won’t even remember this dip.  In the meantime, expect more volatility and lower lows. 
Your high-quality holdings will eventually persevere and go on to new highs.

Our job is to sit back, collect our growing dividends and ignore the news.

Some of us are yet to retire and still reinvesting income.  For us in the accumulation phase, lower prices are actually better.

I am reading a book about dividend investing by Daniel Peris called The Ownership Dividend. He is a historian and looks at stock investing over hundreds of years. 
It’s a bit academic but nonetheless very interesting so far.  His basic premise is that there used to be a much tighter relationship between stock prices, dividend payouts and company valuations, and that we are going to trend back towards that in the future.
It should be good for our type of investing.  Highly recommended for those seeking perspective on long term dividend growth investing.

In spite of the doom and gloom, February was busy for dividend increases.  These companies are confident that their ability to pay us income forever, will be higher, in the near future.  That is optimism.
Dividend increases drive share prices higher so we win both ways.

I had to cut and paste it because there are too many to re-type.  Information is courtesy of a site called Dividend Growth Investing & Retirement.

Dividend increases in the month from the Canadian Dividend All-Star List (5 or more years of consecutive annual dividend increases):

1. goeasy Ltd. (TSE:GSY): 24.8% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 10 years, Yield: 3.5%]
2. Brookfield Corporation (TSE:BN): 12.5% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 13 years, Yield: 0.6%]
3. Stella-Jones Inc. (TSE:SJ): 10.7% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 20 years, Yield: 1.8%]
4. CCL Industries Inc. (TSE:CCL.B): 10.3% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 23 years, Yield: 1.7%]
5. Thomson Reuters Corp. (TSE:TRI): 10.2% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 31 years, Yield: 1.3%]
6. FirstService Corporation (TSE:FSV): 10.0% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 12 years, Yield: 0.6%]
7. Manulife Financial Corporation (TSE:MFC): 10.0% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 11 years, Yield: 3.9%]
8. Intact Financial (TSE:IFC): 9.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 20 years, Yield: 1.9%]
9. Great-West Lifeco Inc. (TSE:GWO): 9.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 10 years, Yield: 4.6%]
10. Toromont Industries Ltd (TSE:TIH): 8.3% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 35 years, Yield: 1.7%]
11. Canadian General Investments, Limited (TSE:CGI): 8.0% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 12 years, Yield: 2.8%]
12. Stantec Inc. (TSE:STN): 7.1% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 13 years, Yield: 0.7%]
13. Restaurant Brands International Inc. (TSE:QSR): 6.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 10 years, Yield: 3.8%]
14. Restaurant Brands International LPs (TSE:QSP.UN): 6.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 10 years, Yield: 3.8%]
15. Guardian Capital Group Ltd (TSE:GCG.A): 5.4% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 14 years, Yield: 3.4%]
16. TMX Group Limited (TSE:X): 5.3% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 9 years, Yield: 1.6%]
17. Gibson Energy Inc. (TSE:GEI): 4.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 5 years, Yield: 8.0%]
18. TC Energy Corporation (TSE:TRP): 3.3% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 24 years, Yield: 5.3%]
19. Magna International Inc. (TSE:MG): 2.1% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 15 years, Yield: 5.3%]
20. Nutrien Ltd. (TSE:NTR): 0.9% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 7 years, Yield: 4.2%]
21. StorageVault Canada Inc. (TSE:SVI): 0.5% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 9 years, Yield: 0.3%]
22. Quebecor Inc. (TSE:QBR.B): 7.7% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 1 year, Yield: 4.2%]
23. Equitable Group Inc. (TSE:EQB): 4.1% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 3 years, Yield: 2.0%]
24. Canadian Apartment Properties Real Estate Investment Trust (TSE:CAR.UN): 3.3% Dividend Increase [Dividend Streak: 1 year, Yield: 3.8%]

If you or someone you know has a situation where a registered account such as an RRSP, TFSA, FHSA etc should have had a beneficiary listed and that person deceased, there are forms with CRA to fix the error.
It is time sensitive, but I think its interesting that such errors can be reversed.

It’s tax season.  If you have property in the US that cost more than $100,000 Canadian dollars, please be diligent about making sure your tax pro files a T1135 form.  Penalties are significant for non-compliance.

Attached is a super article about dividends versus GICs.  I disagree with the author’s articles about deferring CPP and OAS, but agree completely about dividends.

I just made my RRSP contribution for next year.  Why wait?

My youngest daughter is doing a degree in Chemistry.  Their assignment was to purify chemicals by turning them into crystals, then back in the chemicals. 
If you watched the Breaking Bad series… something like that.
She shared a picture of her crystals on Instagram and was subsequently locked her out of her account.  To her it’s like oxygen so she was devastated.  We live in interesting times.

As for the volatility, this too shall pass.

Spring is here.  Have a wonderful March.

Derek Moran

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