Canada’s big banks still rewarding investors

Article Excerpt

Canada’s top banks remain key investments for any portfolio, even as the possibility of lower interest rates and slower housing markets raise their risk levels. In fact, each of them is suitable for new buying. We do, however, see Bank of Nova Scotia (see page 81) and TD Bank as our top picks given their fast-growing international operations. ROYAL BANK OF CANADA $101 (Toronto symbol RY; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.4 billion; Market cap: $141.4 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.4; Dividend yield: 4.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.rbc.com) earned $3.23 billion in its fiscal 2019 second quarter, ended April 30, 2019. That’s up 5.6% from $3.06 billion a year earlier. Due to fewer shares outstanding, per-share earnings rose 6.8%, to $2.20 from $2.06. If you exclude unusual items, Royal earned $2.23 a share in the latest quarter. Earnings from retail banking (48% of the total) rose 6.2%, mainly due to higher loan and deposit volumes. Rising interest rates…