The S&P ADR Index, which tracks some of the largest foreign companies traded on U.S. markets, also includes many ordinary Canadian equities. The top nine Canadian energy companies are listed below. Energy trusts are excluded.

1. Cameco Corp. (CCJ)
Sector: Mining - Uranium
Earnings Growth (5 year): 10.21%

Investors with a more bullish view on natural gas prices might want to look to TransCanada Corp. (TRP) as a derivative play on the commodity. Higher natural gas prices would provide earnings upside for the company due to an expected improvement in power prices, particularly in Alberta, according to RBC Capital Markets analyst Robert Kwan.

He noted that in the past week, several coal plant outages combined with the recent uptick in gas prices, has pushed Alberta power prices above an average of C$100 MW per hour. Alberta power prices troughed in the second quarter and RBC anticipates an improvement going forward.

The previous post looked at Dividend Reinvestment Plans (DRIPs) and Share Purchase Plans (SPPs) as candidates for the cheapest way to invest. Let’s fill in a few more details.

The world’s population keeps growing—we are at almost 7 billion—and more people need more energy. For investors, the question is not whether energy is the right investment, but which kind. Oil is still the prime source for energy, followed by coal and gas, and I propose that at least for the next decade or two, oil and gas will remain in this top position.

As for coal, I am somewhat less enthusiastic because of its lower energy density (by mass) and the inability to distribute it via pipelines. However, most importantly, I believe that the increasing focus on so-called alternative and renewable energies will, at least in the short run, not just fail to decrease but probably increase world consumption of fossil fuels.

LUVMW Spells Diversification: Pepsico (PEP), Procter & Gamble (PG), Schlumberger (SLB), Devon Energy (DVN), SPDR Gold Shares (GLD), Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM), Randgold Resources (GOLD), CPLF Energia (CPL), Cemig (CIG), TransCanada (TRP), StatoilHydro (STO)

Bank of America (BAC)

One of the Dividend Indices in the family of Dow Jones Stoxx Dividend Indices is the "Dow Jones STOXX® Americas Select Dividend 40 Index". The objective of this index is "to measure the performance of the highest dividend-paying stocks relative to their home markets."

Some of the unique features of these STOXX Dividend indices are:

Recently MoneySense magazine of Canada published the ten best stocks to buy and hold for the next 10 years. The stocks selected are listed below:

• Boeing (BA)
• Cemex (CX)
• eBay (EBAY)
• Fairfax Financial (FFH)
• Leucadia National (LUK)
• JNJ
• Microsoft (MSFT)
• Service Corp. (SCI)
• Transcanada (TRP)
• Wal-Mart (WMT)

Of the ten stocks above, the majority of them are U.S. companies. eBay (EBAY) and Microsoft (MSFT) are tech companies whose glory days are long gone. They are definitely not long-term investment picks. Microsoft would have been a great pick in the late 80s when it went went public. After the dot com bubble collapse, other than a handful of tech outfits such as Apple (APPL), most are out of favor with investors. Microsoft is yet to come up with a quality product after Windows and many of the newer versions have not been successful. They lost the search engine wars and now they are trying hard to beat Google (GOOG) with their Bing search engine. Despite having billions in cash, Microsoft still does not pay a decent dividend. Many investors question the logic behind hoarding huge sums of cash when it can’t be put into use in R&D to develop useful products.

UBS has made a few changes to its 12-stock portfolio this week, taking a more defensive stance in anticipation of seasonal headwinds in the latter part of the summer.

George Vasic, UBS Canadian market strategist, first swapped Petro Canada (PCZ) with Suncor Energy (SU) ahead of their pending merger. He then replaced Toronto Dominion Bank (TD), rated Neutral by UBS, with Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CM), rated a Buy by fellow analyst Peter Rozenberg.

With the end of June comes the start of summer: warm air, hot beaches and, sometimes, choppy waters. The following is a recap of last month’s market action and key developments from “30,000 feet” .

The month of June saw North American stocks end up in slightly positive territory. On a total return basis, the S&P/TSX Composite Index gained 0.3% and the S&P 500 Index was up just 0.2% .

I just finished reading a book called "Game Over" by Dr. Stephen Leeb, and I am not sure what to make of it. The basis of the book, at least how I have read it, is that there is going to be a pressing demand for resources (Oil, Natural Gas and all sorts of Mining products) that will push the price of these products to points that will force inflation-like conditions as there were in the 1970's (if not much worse).

His theory goes further on to say that unlike the 1970s (where most of the demand for oil was caused by Political conditions), this spike in prices is one that is more of a permanent nature, as the spike is more due to a lack of supply caused by a scarcity of the materials and/or the ability to extract the materials at a rate to meet the demand.

By Sheraz Mian

Exxon (XOM) has finally decided to throw its weight behind the TransCanada Corp. (TRP)-sponsored Alaska Pipeline project that will bring stranded Alaskan natural gas to consuming markets in the U.S. Lower 48. TransCanada’s 1,700 mile, 48-inch diameter pipeline has the support of the Alaskan and Canadian governments. The Alaska government passed legislation last year that would subsidize the initial project costs by up to $500 million.

In a previous article, I provided a list with the best dividend stocks for the long run. Since the list included only US stocks several readers asked for a similar list with international dividend growth stocks instead. Furthermore, I am also looking to expand my portfolio to include at least some allocation to global dividend companies.

I do agree that in the globalized society of the 21st century it is important do be able to diversify your stock investments away from the US. By purchasing international stocks one essentially receives income in a different currency, which is a decent hedge against a possible devaluation of the US dollar. Another benefit of shopping for quality dividend stocks abroad is the huge potential for economic growth and development that both established and emerging economies posses.

As posted in my blog, historically oil and gas both peak in the summer months. As we can see from last year's chart, oil peaked in mid July.

The rip-roaring rally in stocks since early March might have left some investors feeling like they missed the boat. But there are still some good buys in the market if you are a dividend or income investor. Of note are non-cyclical companies with high and growing dividends.

Is it really possible to have your cake and eat it too? Can you really find a stock that offers very “visible” earnings, yet with some decent upside? I think so, and here are two of them…..

Enbridge has rarely ever been considered a cheap stock, so you’ll have to pay up for it. It trades at about 15x expected 2010 Earnings, and rarely falls down below 14x Forward earnings. However, this is down from its traditional multiple of about 20x, and offers a decent long-term entry point. With a 4% dividend, good growth prospects (analysts forecast about a 10% Annual growth rate for the next 5 years) and a strong defensive nature, it is a good long term hold. Expect it to return to its traditional multiples when Credit markets ease up, with a 12 month target price of close to $45 to $48 CDN.

A concern to be watched with TRP is that some analysts were concerned about its ability to raise capital for some of its many projects. This concern seems to have been eased somewhat, by the fact that the company has a strong balance sheet and it was able to raise over $5B late in 2008 (which does help to show the confidence that many in the market have in this stock). With a dividend just shy of 5%, and solid (but steady) growth in the future, it isn’t unreasonable that TRP could break through its 52 week high of $40.71 CDN in the next 12 months.

Foreign utility stocks have performed well off the lows seen in March this year, similar to the financial sector. While the financial sector gets most of the media attention due to the stress-tests in the US, as well as bailouts and other events, I wanted to find out how the foreign utility sector was performing since the March lows. The results of my research are displayed below in table form.

Performance of foreign utilities since March lows:

• 50% Equity
• 14% bonds
• 27% Real Assets such as real estate (6%), commodities (11%), inflation protected bonds (5%) and infrastructure (5%)

• Airport / Highways / Railroad / Ports / Bridges / Tunnels
• Utilities: Electric, Gas, Water, Alternative, etc
• Transmission systems / Distribution systems
• Oil & Gas Storage & Transportation
• Construction & Engineering , Heavy Electrical Equipment
• Education facilities / Healthcare properties
• Communications towers / Cable networks

ETF	Company	Symbol	Market Cap
IGF	TransCanada Corporation	TRP	$15.2B
IGF	Spectra Energy Corp	SE	$9.4B
IGF	Enbridge Inc	ENB	$11B
GII	EXELON CORPORATION	EXC	$31.4B
GII	FPL Group, Inc	FPL	$21.4B
GII	Southern Company	SO	$24.0B
PXR	ABB Ltd	ABB	$34.2B
PXR	Caterpillar Inc	CAT	$19.5B
PXR	Ingersoll-Rand Co. Ltd	IR	$5.3B