The Canadian Investor - 8 Stocks to Consider for Your TFSA in 2026

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

We’ve got fresh TFSA room for 2026, so we’re switching it up with a list of 8 stocks that we think are worth considering inside a TFSA. This isn’t a deep dive, it’s a clear bull case + key risks for each idea. We hit everything from a data-and-subscription business getting punished by “AI disruption” fears, to a global infrastructure/engineering compounder riding grid and capex cycles, to a Canada-based gold producer with unusual valuation metrics, and a copper-heavy miner tied to electrification and AI-driven power demand. We also debate a quiet compounder in auto services, a steady dividend “bond proxy” (and why rates matter), a subprime lender where the upside is big but regulation and credit risk are real, and a post-pandemic cash machine trading like the market thinks growth is gone for good Tickers discussed: TRI.TO, WSP.TO, WDO.TO, TECK-B.TO, BYD.TO, FTS.TO, PRL.TO, ZM New to investing? Check out these episodes: Investment Accounts Simplified and 5 Stocks on Our Radar Apple Podcast Spotify Web player 3 Things to Do Before You Invest a Single Dollar Apple Podcast Spotify Web player 8 simple ways to Save and Have More Money to Invest Apple Podcast Spotify Web player Investment Accounts Simplified and 5 Stocks on Our Radar Apple Podcast Spotify Web player Check out our portfolio by going to Jointci.com Our Website Our New Youtube Channel! Canadian Investor Podcast Network Twitter: @cdn_investing Simon’s twitter: @Fiat_Iceberg Braden’s twitter: @BradoCapital Dan’s Twitter: @stocktrades_ca Want to learn more about Real Estate Investing? Check out the Canadian Real Estate Investor Podcast! Apple Podcast - The Canadian Real Estate Investor  Spotify - The Canadian Real Estate Investor  Web player - The Canadian Real Estate Investor Asset Allocation ETFs | BMO Global Asset Management Sign up for Fiscal.ai for free to get easy access to global stock coverage and powerful AI investing tools. Register for EQ Bank, the seamless digital banking experience with better rates and no nonsense. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Welcome to the Canadian investor podcast. We are back for a fun episode. We're going to be going over four stocks each, mostly Canadian names, I think one or two U.S. names as well, that we think are really worth considering for a TFSA. So I think there might be some names that we own. Most of the ones I'm talking about, I don't think I own, and I think you own one of them. But I think it'll be fun, especially in the new year. There's the brand new TFSA room. Can you remind me how much it is for this year? 7,000 for this year. 7,000. So for those who were maxed out already, or if you're just starting to invest and you have

ample room, whichever it is, I think these will be some good names to consider. We'll try to, we'll explain why we think they're good fits for the TFSA, but also some of the risks to consider for each of the names. So Dan, do you want to get us started and then we'll go one and one and then get to all the eight names? It's not a deep dive. It's just a quick overview as to why we think these could be some good TFSA plays for 2026. Yeah, the one thing I will say about the TFSA room, though, before we start, there was a lot of, sometimes if you Google it, you get the, like Google, you know, the AI overviews, it'll give you the FHSA room.

It's really bad. Okay. So it'll say 8,000. Yeah, so just another thing about AI, about how, you know, sometimes it hallucinates, but yeah, I've got that a couple of times. But the room is 7,000 for the year, 8,000 for the FHSA. But yeah, the first company is Thompson Reuters. And I know we talked about this in that episode with the 32 biggest companies.

I think when people think of large-cap companies in Canada, this is probably one that they would have a very difficult time naming. Like it's, I mean, I'm not going to lie. Even like five years ago, I barely knew about this company. Like obviously, I knew about Reuters, but I thought it was nothing more than like a website, you know, a news distribution website, things like that. But it's quite a bit more. People do need to understand with this. It's at 52-week lows, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's a bargain. The company is still pretty expensive on a relative basis, but when we look to historical

averages, we're now at 15 plus percent discounts. And I think, you know, fear is the main driving factor here. So much like Constellation Software, Reuters isn't really doing anything wrong operationally. If you look to the organic growth of its, it's big three. It's better now than it was three or four years ago. But there is potential AI disruption here. and the one thing that Thompson Reuters has thrived on for many years is access to data. And we're seeing that with a lot of these companies like, you know, LLMs, you know, their ability to kind of highlight and showcase data.

Like a lot of the companies that deal with this type of stuff, they're under a lot of pressure. So in a nutshell, Thompson Reuters owns a ton of data, a gigantic database that they've owned for multiple decades. And they issue that data subscription base to companies, you know, to make their lives easier. And it just so happens like a lot of those companies aren't industries where there's a boatload of money to be made. So you're talking like lawyers, accountants, corporations. And the big question here, the big fear here is, you know, if chat GPT can answer a legal question, why would I ever use something like Thompson Reuters?

And I mean, to me, I think this is way overblown. Like, first off, LLMs train off publicly available data. So a lot of the data that Thompson Reuters has is not publicly available. It's all, you know, like they are the only ones who own it. And I mean, secondly, you're talking about. industries that deal with mega amounts of money. Like, as I mentioned, an LLM,

like Google's LLM made a mistake on the TFSA contribution room. That's a very simple mistake. Like, you imagine a lawyer or somebody making a mistake on, you know, a case or an accountant making a mistake on the books, like just based off, you know,

a LLM hallucination. So, yeah. I think it's, you know, the stock isn't cheap here, but the one thing is Thompson Reuters is rolling out a lot of money to develop LLMs on that proportion. proprietary data, so the data it owns. So I think these companies would utilize an LLM if it was

specifically designed with that specific data set in there. So it's an interesting one. Like, would I buy it right now? Like not well, potentially. I mean, it's definitely on my watch list. It's a lot cheaper than it was. And I think it's going to be one of those situations where the market thinks headwind, but I think potentially tailwind in the future. Yeah. No, I think that's a great name that definitely I learned a bit more when we did that episode, you and I together. So it's a company I wasn't super familiar. Definitely thought their main business was just the news.

Yeah. So it's kind of interesting. But no, very interesting name. Now next on the list here for me is WSP Global. I know you own this name. WSP Global, which is pretty large company. Not quite large enough to make the list of the 30 largest Canadian companies. We had a comment on YouTube asking why it didn't make it.

The cutoff was around $45 billion or so. It was in the 40s. So WSP, even though it's a large company, not quite there. Revenue growth over the last five years, 15% per year. So very interesting revenue growth. Freecastle per share over the last five years has grown at a clip of 9%. so really interesting business still growing. The bulk case here, really big secular head tailwinds here.

As a global engineering firm and consulting form, WSP is heavily exposed to sectors that will have massive long-term spending, at least if everything goes right and the trends continue right now. So whether it's energy transition, decarbonization, climate resiliency, power grid buildout, especially with some of the recent acquisitions. position, other large infrastructure projects by governments, especially if the economy starts slowing down and we might see governments trying to put money into the economy via infrastructure projects that would benefit a company like WSP Global.

They have a record backlog too. They are sitting on a backlog of $16 billion Canadian. For context, this has more than double compared to 2020. It was around $8 billion then. And it gives investors about a year wards of revenue in terms of visibility, because that's around what their revenue is per year. So you essentially know they at least have a runway of a year, obviously well beyond that. It everything goes well. But I think this is a really interesting play.

The bare case here, valuation. Valuation is not cheap, as those can see on joint TCI. It's trading on a trailing 12 months basis at 40, price to earning. and price to fee cash flow in 19. If you start looking forward, it does get into a much better territory here, so a PF 22 looking forward and price to free cash flow around 26.

So it does make a bit more sense on the valuation. But it always trades at a premium. So you can even make the case that the price is trading at right now is actually pretty reasonable compared to the last five years for WSP. Now, one of the bare case, again, here and other things to be wary of is that they are getting quite large and size does matter. So as they get larger, well, yeah.

Yeah, exactly. As I said that, I'm like, oh boy. Yeah. But it does make a difference because the acquisitions have to be large and larger to actually move the needle or they have to make more of them. So you have to keep that in mind. They have a really good track record, but it may be a bit more now. organic growth versus acquisition base, we'll have to see going forward.

And public sector, right? If for whatever reason governments around the world start wanting to cut cost and start reducing spending, it will definitely affect some of the infrastructure projects that we're anticipating that we'll go ahead in the next five to 10 years. But overall, I think very solid company, it's one that's on my radar. So definitely I think you could do worse things than adding that to your TFS. in 2026. Yeah, I think they're, like with all the acquisitions, I think 30% of their kind of revenue base now

is energy and power. So they're definitely like pivoting towards a really big, like grid, grid buildouts, power, things like that. And I guess the only other thing I'll mention about WSP is a lot of people ask like WSP over something like Atkins Realist, which would be S&C Labelan because it's done quite well, but the main difference between these two companies is Atkins is an EPC company, which kind of means they do the engineering, but they also do, you know, the procurement and the construction. Like they actually kind of get, you know, shovels in the ground, whereas WSP is more,

you know, they're just the consulting, the engineering, things like that. So there's a whole lot of different risks between these two companies. Don't just think they're kind of apples to apples because it's probably the number one company I get it compared against. But they're, they're very They're similar, but they're also very different. Calling all DIY, do-it-yourself investors. Blossom is an essential app for you. It has been blowing up with now more than 50,000 Canadians plus and growing who are using the app.

Every time I go on there, I am shocked. The engagement is amazing. This is a really vibrant community that they're building. And people share their portfolios, their trades, their investment ideas in real time. And it's all built on the concept of transparency because brokerage accounts are linked. And then once you link your brokerage account, you can get in-depth portfolio insights, track your dividends. And there's other stuff like learning duolingo style education lessons that are completely free.

You can search up Blossom Social in the app store and join the community today. I'm on there. I encourage you go on there and follow me. Search me up. Some of the YouTubers and influencers and podcasters that you might know, I bet you they're already on there. People are just on there talking, sharing their investment ideas, and using the analytics tools. So go ahead, blossom social in the app store, and I'll see you there.

I recently had to travel to Calgary for some medical treatments, and I wanted it to feel like a home away from home while I was recovering. I found an apartment on Airbnb that made all the difference. While I was on demand, it helped that I could cook some homemade meal in a real kitchen and just sit in and comfortable living room or rest in bed. Having a space that actually felt like home helped me focus on my recovery rather than the stress of the trip. It really got me thinking about our own place. That host had provided me with some much needed comfort when I really needed it, and maybe our home could do the same for someone else. Hosting our home on Airbnb would let guests experience our neighborhood while giving us a little extra money to put toward a fun trip when I'm back on

my feet. Plus, it's flexible. We decide exactly when it makes sense to host our home. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca slash host. Okay, let's move on to your next name here on the list on number three. Yeah, so this is West dome gold, and I know this company a bit because we did cover it. It would have been like five years ago or so, but I ended up having to remove it because, I mean, the volatility was was pretty crazy back, you know, during the pandemic. But it's been on a wild run over the last while. And I think it was kind of in the doghouse for quite a while because it only had a single mine.

But it has expanded since. And it's primarily a gold producer. They're all in sustaining costs are around $1,500 US dollars an ounce. So this would be higher than, I mean, what is Agniko? I think Agniko is in like the mid-1300s. Yeah, yeah. If I remember correctly, it's around there. Yeah.

But the difference here is the producing mine from Westome, the Eagle River mine, only has all in sustaining costs of around $1,200. So what they're doing is they're dumping a bunch of money into other mines getting up to production. And once those stop eating up capital, the cost could go down. And the really interesting element here from Westholm is all the mines. lines are in Canada. So jurisdiction risk doesn't really exist all that much. I mean, it's a small cap gold company. So it's probably a midcap now. So there's a lot of risk with, you know, how, you know, generally midcap gold companies are, our boom and bust management, you know, has been, has been pretty poor over the last while from a lot of these companies. But, I mean, they're debt-free.

They have operating margins north of 50 percent. And the one thing that puzzles me here, and I do have to dig a bit deeper into why, you know, I might never understand why, but the company trades at 7x expected earnings and 12x trailing. So, I mean, I don't know why it's so cheap. It's not like people are bearish on the price of gold. So it kind of confuses me as to why this one is cheap, especially after like the large run-up and price, all Canadian mines, debt-free. It's trading at like a quarter of the price of Agneco. It's, it's, I'm not sure. Yeah. But yeah, it's, it's an interesting gold option. Like if you're looking for, you know, kind of a mid cap, I guess I could say, it's probably got a market cap of around $4 billion now. Yeah. But yeah, it's done very well.

Like, this isn't a, you know, the increase in share price over the last while has been due to results. Like, it's definitely put up strong results, which is why it's increased so much in price. And I think if gold kind of stays maintained or even continues to come up, like they've been, they've been executing pretty well. I mean, as with any other minor, I would make this a very small allocation if I were personally going to buy it. Like they're volatile. You know, if gold kind of, if the bottom falls out of gold, you know, it's never a guarantee, but I would imagine this one falls significantly more than a company like Agneco, but it also has operated, you know, it's done quite a bit better just because, you know, smaller, just more potential overall. Yeah, I mean, I'm bullish on gold long term.

But it doesn't mean that you can see some pretty significant bull bag. But the good thing with miners is you'll often see miners lag the price of the metal, whether it's gold and silver, whatever metal it is, because especially when there's some quick and big moves, the market wants to see if that price is sustainable. Because as an extreme example, it's trading at 46 now. Let's say it goes up to 5,000 tomorrow. Just randomly it'll go up to 5,000.

Well, the market is going to want to see is this like, just a weak blip or is it kind of the new level where it should kind of trade around? So that's why you'll often see a delay with minor. But then again, miners are still very volatile. They have a lot of costs. And again, they're going to be very dependent on the price of the metal. So always be careful there. But that's an interesting name.

I don't know why it's so cheap. I'll have a look as well. The one thing I will say, I think it's just because of heavy spending. Like they're dumping, you know, almost half of their operating cash flow back into mines. Like, you know, it's like I would imagine that is why. It's just a bit riskier perspective. But again, it's Canadian operated mine. It's an interesting company.

Okay. Now let's go keep staying in the mining sector here, tech resources. There was a lot of news for tech resources over the last couple of years because they had a steel coal-making business that they sold. And then last year, there was news that came out and obviously now we're kind of seeing it like it should go forward, but they will be merging if everything goes well with Anglo-American. Now, the bold case here for tech resources is pretty straightforward. If you think metals like copper and zinc that tend to be tied to economic growth, but also when it comes to copper, you have the electrification.

the power grid that needs to be modernized, expanded with all the demand for AI. If you're bullish on that, then you'll likely be bullish on this name. They get about 60% of their revenue from copper and the rest from zinc. And there's a strong case to be made again that copper will continue to be in high demand because of AI amongst other things. But typically as humanity progresses, our energy consumption tends to go up as well, even if you forget AI, but AI is almost putting that on just on hyperdrive, right? Now, with the merger with Anglo-American, they would be around the,

they would definitely be in the top five producers of copper in the world. So something, definitely a major player here. And you're looking at a bit more of a pure play in terms of copper and other metals or other minerals like zinc. The bare case here is there is definitely some execution risk, especially we've seen with their Quoibrada Blanca Phase 2 project in Chile, which has seen some significant delays. There's also some political risk associated with Chile as well. And there's a lot of their future growth associated with that. So there's definitely some risk there.

But the political climate, too, has become more challenging for minors with higher royalty, taxes, stricter environmental permanency. coming from countries. When you have governments, especially in some countries where around the world, and I'm not talking specifically here about, you know, any specific country, but when you have governments eyeing these companies, they're seeing that their profits are going way up, the price of minerals are going way up. You have an extra incentive for governments wanting to at least get part of that increase in price to pat up their revenue coffers.

So there's always going to be that incentive and that political risk. If the global economy slows down, of course, it will likely affect the price of commodities, including copper and zinc, and that would drive down their revenue. And of course, if for whatever reason, if AI spending slowed down, the electrical grid modernization kind of slows down, that would also have a significant impact on their revenues. We also don't know if the merger will go ahead, although I think the Canadian government has given its approval there.

So I think unless there's anything unforeseen, it should happen within the next year or so. So all things to consider. But overall, if you're bullish on, I think, AI and the expansion of AI, this is definitely a way to play it without, you know, kind of an indirect way to play it. Yeah, it's a pretty good company. Obviously, one that's been very cyclical because it's, you know,

pretty much a pure metals company. I would say most of the grid build out, I mean, would be aluminum rather. Obviously, electrification with copper. It's still, like, it's still definitely a bullish, bullish aspect,

but a lot of the major electrical stuff is aluminum. But, yeah, it's, I mean, copper is a whole lot more expensive than it was, I mean, even 10 years ago,

and it's, it's only going to continue to go up. And I mean, it's, like, even housing market, like, stuff like that,

lots of copper spending. it's pretty easy to be bullish on copper and this one's huge copper exposure okay so now uh the next name for you so number five yeah so this is the one i own i was trying to do this list just based on companies that i just don't own but i ended up falling on this one and that is um boyd group so i've been buying this one for kind of the better part of two or three years it operates in yeah yeah you haven't shut up about it i know and it hasn't done anything so it hasn't moved no that's boyd gaming that's a different. Oh,

there you go. B-YD. T-O. They are going on, they are issuing on the New York Stock Exchange soon because of an acquisition. But this is like,

it's an automobile and collision company. So Boyd in Canada and then they operate Gerber Collision in the U.S. And they made an accurate. Yeah, Boyd gaming, the chart look way better. Yeah.

Yeah. They acquired Joe Hudson's Collision Center in the United States. So this increases their total shop count by 25% in a single go. And then what they're going to do is they're going to use, I can't even remember how it works,

but effectively they're going to go public in the U.S. They're going to list on the New York Stock Exchange after this. And that acquisition does make Boyd the largest player in the space. But the thing about it is it only has a single digit market share. So it's the largest company in the space, but it owns just a fraction of the market because, I mean, just so many mom-and-pop type repair shops. And they acquire a ton of them.

This is like, it's pretty much, like the main business model is they acquire these mom and pop shops or like, you know, tiny branded shops. They acquire them, improve the margin profile just because, you know, they're at a larger scale and kind of profit. Leading up to the pandemic, this was one of the best compounders in, in the country. I mean, if you would have bought it at IPO in 2001, you'd have a $10,000 investment would be worth $1 million in 2020. So it's not a, you know, it's a company that's done very well, but COVID caused. a ton of issues that were largely out of the company's control. First, rapid inflation kind of, you know, it led to margins taking a hit. It couldn't offset cost of materials through insurers fast enough.

You know, 90 plus percent of this company's business is through insurance companies. So it had a bit of difficulty with that. And then during COVID, when automobile prices spiked, there was so much demand from repairs that they just, they couldn't find enough labor to actually, you know, do all the repairs. And now we kind of seen a reverse situation. Used automobile started to fall. And what ended up happening was when they fall, insurance companies are more prone to riding off vehicles rather than repairing them.

So they ended up getting a lot lower claims volume. It's just been a wild five years. And the one thing about this company, I find a very interesting company to compare to this one is copart. Do you know who co-part is? Like they're pretty popular. Pretty popular company. So Copart is the exact opposite of Boyd. So Boyd needs cars to be damaged, but repairable because they need to come into the shops get repaired. Whereas Copart, they want the cars written off because they're kind of a salvage website. You know, they sell the vehicles, they auction off the vehicles, they sell the parts, stuff like that. So there's an interesting element because right when Boyd started

reporting that its same store sales were improving and repairable claims were coming back up. Like, Copart was reporting the exact opposite. And if you look at Copart's share price, like back in May, like when Boyd started reporting that things were getting better, Copart just went on a complete dive because it started reporting that things were, you know, getting a little bit rougher with them. But just needs a normal environment because it is, I believe it's a high quality company. It just needs like a normal operating environment. And it hasn't really gotten that for five plus years, but starting to see a bit of a turnaround now. Okay.

No, that's a good one here. So now we'll move on to the next one on the list, number six. A name that I think is very popular with dividend investors, Fortis. I know you're pretty familiar with it, right? I own it, yeah. I've owned Fortis since like, I want to say like 2013. I've owned it for a very, very long time. Yeah.

It's really one of the top utilities. Definitely a model of consistency for utilities. They've raised a dividend for over 50 years, which makes it one of the few dividend kings in Canada. It's only two. Canadian utilities and this one. But I would consider like Fortis, like Canadian utilities does have that long of a streak,

but they just raise the dividend by like a penny every year. Yeah, just to keep it going. Yeah, Fortis is definitely going to be like mid-single digits. for the most part, and they're aiming to grow the dividend by another 4 to 6%. You also get some geographical diversification with operations in Canada and the U.S. primarily, but also some in the Caribbean. They're investing heavily in growth, which should allow them to grow their rate base around 7% per year. Now, since they operate in a mostly regulated industry, the higher the rate base, the higher

they can actually have revenue. Usually it will be a percentage of that, and it should benefit from the overall demand. for electricity through its ownership of transmission companies in the U.S. Given that the contribution in the TFSC is finite, so you don't have unlimited contribution room, you definitely don't want a YOLO in and put everything in one risky asset. That would be a big no-no for the TFSA. It's a great recipe to make a lot of money or lose a lot of money

and lose all your contribution room in that beautiful tax-free room. So you likely won't outperform the markets here with a Fortis, even when looking at total returns, but you'll get steady returns. And if you don't want to be on, if you're kind of risk averse and you want to conserve that contribution room, there are worse things than owning Fortis. Now, the bare case is the valuation is definitely on the higher end compared to other utilities. There's not as much of a bold case in terms of multiple expansion here. inflation is at a risk. So if it picks up, there can be a lag until the utilities are actually allowed by regulators to increase their rates to offset that inflation. It would also mean potential higher rates from central banks, which would drain capital from higher yielding companies like Florida. So we saw that. I believe they had a pretty good drawdown in 2022, right? If I remember correctly, just looking at the, yeah, exactly. So you saw. You saw Ford is being and other utilities being bit up pretty high in 2021, 2021 rates were at historical lows because how else could you get yield? You would get these utilities, you'd get REITs, you'd get BC, the telcos that were providing a decent yield because the most you could get was, you know, less than a percent or 1% from government issuance or bonds.

So they definitely benefited from that. But then when 2022 happened and the rate started to go up, it definitely hit the demand for these types of companies because then you could get four and a half, five percent at some point by just holding U.S. treasuries. And another risk factor here is growth will likely be funded by a mix of equity in debt. So of course, that will mean dilution for shareholders. And as a utility, it always has a fairly high level of debt.

So that's not unusual because their castles are pretty steady. But there are other risks we saw. I can't remember the name. But in California with the fires years ago, there was a utility that was. Amera, I believe. Yeah, was it Amera? So they were essentially found like they were the cause of these fires. And I believe they went bankrupt.

Sorry, I don't think it was. Yeah, that wasn't Amera that went bankrupt. But Amera is a company. It was Edison something. Oh, okay. I think back in the day. But anyways, just to show that, yes, it's a utility, but there are still some risk associated with that. And I wanted to outline that.

But overall, I think you could do a lot worse than Fortis in a TFSA. It's not going to crush most likely the index, but it's going to give you some steady returns. So anything else to add before we go to your last name? No, I guess I'll just say I was speaking on like the Florida. they had a bunch of issues there. And Amera operates in Florida, which caused kind of a bit of a dip as well. But yeah,

that's kind of the same with all utilities. I mean, as the risk-free rate goes up, as you can get money, risk-free utilities obviously decline in value because there's no point in taking, as you had mentioned, if treasuries are paying 5%,

why would you take on equity risk? Even though with a company like Fortis, it's pretty low. Obviously, it's more of a bond proxy, but, I mean, risk-free versus, equity risk, it doesn't make sense as they get higher, but as rates get lower, they kind of become more attractive. Yeah, I mean, right now it's reeling 3.6%. I mean, if you get it when it's a bit in a drawdown, you have kind of a best of both worlds, right? You have a decent yield, maybe four and a half,

five percent if you get really in a good drawdown here. And you also have some equity upside. There's always going to be some downside, of course. But that's the difference between, you know, owning treasury, US treasury bills or Canadian treasury bills, you get that different upside. You can still get upside for longer duration bonds, but for the most part, you have more upside with equity. Calling all DIY, do-it-yourself investors, Blossom is an essential app for you. It has been blowing up with now more than 50,000 Canadians plus and growing who are using the app. Every time I go on there, I am shocked. engagement is amazing. This is a really vibrant community that they're building. And people share

their portfolios, their trades, their investment ideas in real time. And it's all built on the concept of transparency because brokerage accounts are linked. And then once you link your brokerage account, you can get in-depth portfolio insights, track your dividends. And there's other stuff like learning duolingo style education lessons that are completely free. You can search up Blossom Social in the app store and join the community today. I'm on. I'm on there. I encourage you go on there and follow me, search me up, some of the YouTubers and influencers and podcasters that you might know, I bet you they're already on there. People are just on there talking, sharing their investment ideas, and using the analytics tools. So go ahead,

blossom social in the app store and I'll see you there. I recently had to travel to Calgary for some medical treatments and I wanted it to feel like a home away from home while I was recovering. I found an apartment on Airbnb that made all the difference. While I was on demand, it helped that I could cook some homemade meal in a real kitchen and just sit in a comfortable living room or rest in bed. Having a space that actually felt like home helped me focus on my recovery rather than the stress of the trip. It really got me thinking about our own place. That host had provided me with some much needed comfort when I really needed it, and maybe our home could do the same for someone else. Hosting our home on Airbnb would let guests experience our neighborhood

while giving us a little extra money to put toward a fun trip when I'm back on my feet. Plus, it's flexible. We decide exactly when it makes sense to host our home. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca.com slash host. Let's go over to your last name here number seven on the list. This is, yeah, this is a, yeah, it is an interesting one. You don't care about that TFSA room, do you? I knew you would not like this one. But I think it's, it's an interesting option for sure. I know we've talked about Go Easy a lot, but I do think, I mean, it's definitely on my watch list. I think it got a bit rich in price for a while, but it has drawn down quite a bit. And that's Propel holding.

This is a Canadian ticker, but it's primarily, like, it's pretty much U.S. and U.K. They do have a little bit of exposure here, but it's very, very minimal. They bought... You're betting on that 10% credit card cap in the U.S., huh? Yeah, I mean, and it could end, just kind of an overall pickup. I think... Which just so people, not just in case they weren't familiar, it is a subprime. Yeah, so Propel is, yeah, subpr...

They go easy effectively in the United States. I mean, they have a little bit of a different business model than GoEasy, a little bit exposure to a different market. But they bought Quid Market, which was kind of their main entry into the UK market. It's worked out, like, unbelievably. I would say they grew 50% in 2025 and 100% in 20, or sorry, they're expected to double the business next year in 2026. And the company's bread and butter, like from them as they use AI underwriting to kind of serve more customers. So they kind of mention that situations where lending is likely not as high risk as imagined, but a human might have rejected it.

They could kind of, you know, lend to that person or vice versa. Maybe a human thinks a situation, a human underwriter would think a situation is potentially profitable. The AI would be able to detect that it isn't. The company is expecting big growth in the future. So earnings are expected to jump by 50% this upcoming year, 35%. over the next couple of years, yet the stock trades at only 7x earnings. So I definitely agree with you about the significant risks, but I mean, at 7x expected earnings, I think a lot of that risk is priced in.

It could get worse. There's absolutely no question. It could get worse. There's a lot of volatility with these stocks. But if you've looked to, you know, the fact that it's down 60%, the market is pricing in ugly results, I guess I would say. And they ended up, so last year they ended up launching a bank in Puerto Rico. So the idea here is that they can now borrow money to lend out cheaper.

So prior they would have had to access. And I mean, I don't know how these subprime lenders work overall, but they would have to have gone to some investment grade credit facility who would have lent them money at say, like, let's say 10%, and then they can go back and lend it to customers for much more than that. Now the company, you know, being financial institution, can kind of get out of the wholesale borrowing market and into the institutional and interbank market. So in theory, they could take that 10% debt or sorry, they could replace it, that 10%

debt with, you know, 5 to 6%, which could be, you know, a pretty big tailwind in earnings without even adding a single customer. I mean, there, again, there is risk here with all lenders, zero question. Like, I am currently digging into this one quite a bit because, like, I think it requires a very good understanding of the U.S. subprime market and the U.K. subprime market because you need to understand these segments. There can be regulations in the U.K. and the U.S. that don't exist here in Canada that can kind of, you know, create a bit of issues. I mean, for example, here in Canada, we had that rate cap. So, I mean, you just, but it is, it's interesting. Look at this. So quid market, so the U.K. one, right? So I borrow 500 pounds.

for five months at a fixed annual rate of 292%. Now, what a great deal. It's crazy. And they're growing. They're doubling the size of that business. So I guess the UK doesn't have a cab then. That's what I mean. Like, that's the thing about, so you get it to the point where, you know, say regulations do come in and they cap it. Like, you really need to understand. And this is kind of one that I've avoided because I didn't really know the U.S. and the UK markets all that well. But I'm definitely, I mean, at 7x expected earnings, I'm definitely looking into them. It's not as cheap as GoEasy. I don't know why that, like GoEasy is trading at something crazy like 5X expected earnings,

but I think the market is probably pricing in the fact that because GoEasy's had higher provisions over the while and have missed expectations the last while. The short report, what it's highlighted, and I think the market is waiting to see what the next few quarters will look like. Yeah. So effectively, like the market is saying. go easy is not going to hit forward expectations and that's why it's so cheap. They probably do with Propel as well, but I think it's, I mean, there's a price for everything. And I think this is like, it's getting to the point where it's definitely, it's a decent look. Speaking of price for everything, Zoom communication. Yes, it's the company that everyone wanted

to own during the pandemic went on a crazy run. While Zoom now, it's definitely not trading as expensively as it did back in the pandemic. Obviously, it was looking, I think it hit a high of close, yeah, of $560 bucks per share. And now it's trading at $83 as we're recording this. Market cap of $26 billion. I wonder how big it was for market cap. Must have been like $300,000, at the peak. Oh, just $170. Okay. So I guess they diluted a bit more shares since Yeah, and Zoom for a lot of people might say, what the hell are you talking about? But let me show you that there's actually some madness or logic to this madness. The bold case.

So the last name here, number eight, the bold case for Zoom, free cash for share in the last three years as grown at a rate of 8% per year. And notice I'm using three years because I'm trying to zero out those pandemic years because clearly that was not sustainable. So I'm really trying to get what's been happening after the pandemic. So essentially 2022 going forward since the return to the office has really started. Free cash on its own has grown at 8.5% clip in that same time period, three years. They have zero debt on the balance sheet and are sitting on a massive $8 billion in cash.

So you're essentially paying three times the value of the cash that they have. to get a pretty good, like pretty good free cash. So, I mean, they're generating around $2 billion in free cash flow per year. And of course, there is a lot of competition. But I don't know about you then, but for the most part, Zoom is the one that seems to work the most flawlessly. Like, I always get annoyed with teams. Google is like kind of hit or miss with Google meets.

We use Riverside because it's really tailored for podcasting. So I think Riverside's a bit better than Zoom for that. specific use, but I think it'd be fine to use Zoom. And I think Zoom's also also cap that 1080P, right? So I don't know about you, but I feel like overall the product they offered is definitely a bit notch above. Yeah. I mean, whenever I get a meeting and it's Zoom, I'm generally the happiest. It's also that it's yeah, it's crazy, it's crazy cheap here. Yeah, exactly. It's really cheap. Their offerings include AI features, whereas large players often will, well, offer those but at an additional cost they've recently passed 10 million paid seats for zoom phones which

is an IP base phone system or web base and they also have a new contact center option they're doing massive buybacks which you can see with the free cash flow per share that i mentioned earlier it's also trading at very low multiple so it's trading at a 15 forward p and free cash will still like whether you look forward or backwards doesn't really matter it's pretty cheap now the bearer cases, there is a lot of competition from large players like Microsoft with Teams, Google with Google meets. And even though I think Zoom does have a better product for a lot of customers, you know, it's just good enough, right? Those offering is just easier. It's already integrated and whatever they use. And Zoom's a bit more of a standalone platform from the most part.

Revenue has grown at around 3.5% per year over the last few years. So definitely not a lot of growth on the revenue side. Again, there was a lot of pull forward growth with the pandemic. So I wouldn't even argue that it's actually not that bad considering the massive growth that they saw during the pandemic. The other question, the bear case, will any of their products of their other products work like their, for example, they have like their documents suite that it's like AI documents, whiteboards, workflow automation.

that remains to be seen. They have expanded it, but I don't think it's gaining that much traction. They have a lot of exposure as well to small businesses, which would impact their revenues in a recession because smaller businesses tend to get hit. They do have some larger customers, but something to keep in mind, there's definitely some added risk there if there's a slowdown. But, I mean, a name, I wanted to look at a software company, because like we were talking, they've been really,

been hit hard and came across Zoom and just just the balance sheet alone is a pretty strong case for this one yeah like the the enterprise value is so you have a market cap of 24.6 billion but the enterprise value is only 16.7 so like yeah because they have a billion on the cat on the balance sheet and cash and no debt like typically you'll see enterprise value would be higher because of the debt but yeah I mean it's crazy they have 4.8 billion dollars in revenue and generate two billion and pre-cash flow. I mean, it's, it kind of seems like a company to me that should just start offering a dividend.

I don't know. Like, they don't pay a dividend. And obviously, like, if they don't feel, you know, they're going to gain any edge investing into anything and building anything out, you make a ton of money. Why not just pay out a dividend? You probably attract potentially a bigger investor base because what? They're growing, they're not really growing that fast anymore. Or look for a strategic acquisition.

Yeah. Or maybe. be even acquisition target by a larger player that would like to integrate that. I don't know, but it's one that I think given the valuation, look, it could be a value trap for sure. They're not growing quickly. That's definitely a riskier with Zoom, but given the valuation you're paying and how the market is down right now on software companies and the amount of free cash flow, I think there's

like a solid margin of safety embedded here in the name. Not a name we've looked at in a very long time. So that rounds it out. So I guess we'll just go sum those names. So we had in no specific order, Thompson, Reuters, ticker TRI, West Dome, Goldmines, ticker WDO, Boyd Group, ticker BYD, Propel Holdings, ticker PRL, WSPGELB, TickrSP, Tickr Prl, WSP Global, Ticker WSP, Tech Resources. I forgot the ticker for that one. Is it T-E-C-K-D-B?

I think it's something like that, right? Okay, I'll continue while. You look, Fortis is... Tech.B. Yeah. Okay, tech.b. Fortis is F-T-S on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Zoom is Z-M.

Yeah. And then that rounds it out here. So hopefully you enjoy this episode. Again, thank you for all the support. If you're new to the podcast, Definitely let us know what you think. We listen to feedback. We try to look at names that people ask us to look at as much as we can.

So yeah, I think it was a fun one. We'll do a bit more of these kind of episodes down the line. Again, thanks for listening. And we'll be back for a news and earnings episode this Thursday. The Canadian Investor Podcast should not be construed as investment or financial advice. The host and guests featured may own securities or assets discussed on this podcast. Always do your own due diligence or consult with a financial professional before making any financial or investment decisions.