INK Top 40 Report

July 29, 2015 - Today we revisit Alimentation Couche-Tarde (ATD) which we last featured in our morning report on October 16th. On that day it closed at $35.25 and it is up 63.3% since then, closing at $57.56 on July 28th (and setting a new 52-week high of $58.75 on July 20th along the way). There has been some recent insider selling from the CEO and CFO which is something to keep an eye on, but at this point it may be nothing more than clearing the decks for more option grants.

Alimentation Couche-Tarde is ranked tenth on the July edition of our INK Edge Top 40 on the equally weighted basis of valuations, insider commitment and price momentum. This is up thirty spots from its rank in the June edition of the list, and it appears to be the beneficiary of the trend that has seen other grocery type companies like Empire Company (INK Edge Outlook: sunny; EMP) and George Weston (INK Edge Outlook: sunny; WN) added to this month's edition of the list.

July 27, 2015 - The Canadian consumer put in a strong showing in May as retail sales jumped 1% over the previous month. That strength could be in jeopardy, however, as policies targeting a lower loonie may put a dent in the prosperity of most Canadians. In particular, if BMO Chief Economist Doug Porter and his colleagues are right, a weakening loonie could soon clobber the real spending growth of Canadians. According to their July 24 report, as the loonie rose from 2002 to 2008, real consumer spending growth in Canada averaged an annualized growth rate of 3.8% which compared favourably to the weak loonie period from 1992-2002 when real consumer spending rose only 2.4% per year. The bottom line, according to the BMO team, is that a weak loonie for the Canadian consumer "is bad news, period."