Topic: Dividend Stocks

Maple Leaf Foods Inc. $21 – Toronto symbol MFI

MAPLE LEAF FOODS INC. $21 (Toronto symbol MFI; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 136.6 million; Market cap: $2.9 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.9; Dividend yield: 1.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.mapleleaf.ca) will soon complete a multi-year restructuring that mainly involves closing older meat-processing plants and shifting their operations to newer facilities. Thanks to these actions, Maple Leaf’s gross profit margin (gross profits as a percentage of revenue) jumped to 7.1% in the third quarter of 2015 from 0.5% a year earlier. However, the company has faced delays and higher-than-expected costs to start up these new plants, so it now expects to reach its goal of raising its gross profit margin to at least 10% in 2016 instead of 2015. Maple Leaf Foods is a hold.

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