The Canadian Investor - Tier Ranking Canada’s 30 Largest Public Companies (Part 1)

Episode Date: January 5, 2026

We’re kicking off a two-part series ranking the 30 largest public companies in Canada based purely on business quality. In Part 1, we tackle the first 15 names—covering everything from banks and pipelines to precious metals—sharing our perspective on which business models stand the test of time and which ones carry more hidden risk. Tickers of stocks discussed: RY.TO, SHOP.TO, TD.TO, BN.TO, ENB.TO, ABX.TO, BMO.TO, BNS.TO, CM.TO, AEM.TO, TRI.TO, WPM.TO, CSU.TO, CNQ.TO, CP.TO The full video of the episode is available on Stocktrades youtube channel. 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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Just my reminder to people who own cyclicals. Don't be surprised when there's a cycle. If there's uncertainty in the markets, there's going to be some great opportunities for investors. This has to be one of the biggest quarters I've seen from this company in quite some time. Welcome back to the Canadian Investor Podcast. My name is Simone Berange. I'm here with Dan Kent.

We have a fun episode we're doing right now. So we're going to do a two-parter. The ranking the 30 biggest companies in Canada by market cap. And we will be ranking them by quality. So the classic YouTube-ish ranking system, you have an S-tier, which are the top of the top, A, B, C, D, and E. I guess E would be terrible. the worst kind of companies.

And of course, we're going to be looking at them really from a quality of a company, not necessarily saying that whether a company goes into the est year, whether it'll be a good investment or not, and a company that goes into the E tier, the last one, whether it's going to be a good investment or not, it could very well be. But we're just going to give our perspective on what we think in terms of how high of a quality business it is.

And we're not factoring valuation here, just the actual business. And we'll give a few kind of lines per name because if not it would go on forever. We have 30 names, so it should be a fun one. Yeah, I think it's more so from a quality business perspective, but generally like the higher quality, the business model, I guess, has usually driven the stronger returns. But you'll probably find like we put some pretty great companies down lower just because, you know the business model overall but it should be uh we'll try to agree we yeah rehearse this so

yeah this is fresh yeah exactly so the first one here the largest company in canada it should be pretty accurate the order we're doing it in just so people are familiar we won't say the market cap you can look at that yourself but the largest company in canada here royal bank of canada ticker r why and i will mention the tickers for the ones i do remember i don't remember i don't remember all of them by heart, but R. Y, I do remember RBC. I will put the ticker in the show notes. Just a quick, quick mention there. So RBC here, so first of all, Dan, what's your overall take on the business? And I'll give my TIG and then we'll do it that way. And then we'll do our ranking. I mean, I think it's effectively the king of Canadian lending. I mean, we've had a pretty rough

Canadian economy over the last while here, but nothing seems to, nothing seems to stop it, really. I mean, Again, valuations have gotten a bit high, but we aren't really touching on that basis. I mean, I would put, it'd be hard not to put RBC and probably the S tier because I do think it's, and I know you don't like banks, but I think it's like it's, if you're going to, like it's, I do think it's the highest quality bank in the country. I'd be S tiering it. Okay. So it's hard to argue it's higher quality. I mean, it does, as a Canadian bank, it does have a lot of exposure to Canada, a lot of domestic risk. Of course, it's as diversified as it can be.

It is a G-Sib, so globally systematic important bank. They are all domestically important, the big banks, but this one is a global one along with TD, which is the other one. I would probably put it at the A tier just because it's a bank, but I agree with you, it's probably the best bank here. So you want to do A or S or do you like that. I guess if you look from the perspective of the bank, business models of the banks. I mean, highly leveraged, exposed to the Canadian economy. You could

argue it's a, because, I guess... It's more diversification, which comes with the territory, I understand. So let's do, are you good with A? I think S does, yeah, S might need to be reserved for, there's a few S tiers on here, but it's probably going to be a few and far between, but they're close. So the next one on the list, Shopify, which I think overtook RBC for a brief period of time, if I remember correctly. Shopify, incredible business, obviously looking at valuation, it is pretty high. But again, we're just looking at the business here. Definitely not as expensive or even clothes than it was in previous year.

But in terms of actual business, it is doing quite good in terms of producing free cash. It produced close to $2 billion in the last 12 months. So something really impressive. And the revenue have been growing 30% plus. they're really integrating a lot of AI into their business. And they're actually getting larger and larger customers to adopt their platform. Yeah, I think even though, I mean, you probably call this the largest, or sorry, the most successful Canadian company of all time, I would argue, like just over the last.

One of the most. It's more successful than Nortel. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah, it's, I mean, great margins. Obviously, it's moved from, you know, kind of a cash burning business to a profitable business. It probably needs growth plus margin expansion at this level. But I mean, if you're looking at

the future in terms of AI, in terms of e-commerce, in terms of, you know, digital shopping, more businesses moving, Shopify would be one that I'd probably put in the S. Yeah, same. I would agree. I almost started with say one that I think would go in the S tier would be Shopify, but I did not want to influence what you were saying. So let's move on here. The second largest Canadian bank, the other G-Sib, like I mentioned before, TD. So the AML scandal will keep weighing on them. So the anti-money laundering, if you're not familiar, essentially they did some things they shouldn't have done in the US. And the regulators over there imposed a capped on asset to TD, meaning that they're not going to be able to grow until

US regulators say they can grow. That's essentially what happened here. And what I fear for TD going forward is I fear that they may try to take on a bit too much lending risk. Canada to compensate for that lack of growth in the U.S. So those are are my general views here for TD. Yeah, and I think a lot of people might have a bit of recency bias in regards to TD just because it's done so well over the last while, but that's mostly because it's been, you know, beat up prior to that. I think it still kind of trails, you know, the better institutions in my opinion, like

Royal or, or say, a national. But I think once you kind of pair with the fact that, you know, it's U.S. business is going to be capped. I mean, I don't think you can put it in the same tier as Royal. I'd probably be going like C. Yeah, I was going to say, I think I'd go see just because the US was such a big reason to have like to light TD and now it's essentially in limbo. And people may say like, oh, it's not going to be for that long.

Just exhibit a look at Wells Fargo. How long did that last for? I think just last year, right? They started lifting those restrictions. I think it lasted almost seven, eight years, if I remember correctly, if not close to 10 years. Well, keep in mind, that was a U.S. bank as well. So we're talking about a Canadian bank. So are our regulators going to be in any rush?

Probably not. Yeah. Okay. So the next one on the list, Brookfield. So Brookfield, I know it's a company that's widely held by our listeners. I own it as well. I know you do as well. And I think from the names we mentioned, which one do you own?

Royal. I see, right? Royal, Royal Bank. Okay. I don't own any of the first three names, just to be clear here. Now, Brookfield, again, I think it's widely owned. It's an asset management business, a reinsurance business. They have renewable power, infrastructure, private equity, private debt, and real estate. I think those are the big lines of businesses. The biggest issue with Brookfield, and you let me know what Tere you'll put it in, is the opacity and how complex all the business. are and how it reports to the mothership and I have to say like I still have trouble understanding the whole like ownership structure and how it goes flows to the mothership so for me if it wasn't for that I'd probably put in nest here but if not because of that probably

but I'll give you I'll let you yeah I think I mean I own Brookfield I think I don't think anybody has like a firm grasp on on the entire operation I think that the complexity to a certain degree is probably the moat. I mean, it allows them to, you know, do no, do more deals than no other asset manager could. I mean, the renewable area like Brookfield Renewables, you could argue it's probably the only renewable player that can, you know, tackle a lot of these agreements from the hypers that it's signing. I mean, the stock trades at a bit of a discount relative to other asset managers, I think,

just because of how complex it is. But it does allow for, you know, a ton of deals, a ton of fundraising, a ton of capital. I'd A tier it as well. yeah just because i mean it's it's a very complicated business yeah exactly and i guess for me i could even make an argument that i put in b tier just because of that private death and p exposure i do yeah they just bought yeah the rest yeah that is one thing that wormees me a little bit about brookfield but i think i'm comfortable with a none nonetheless now the next one on the list Another company that I think is pretty widely held by listeners,

and I know dividend investors are talking about Enbridge here. So one of the largest pipeline operators in North America, I think it's the second largest after Kinder Morgan, or right around the same size. So a stable business should benefit from new investments in energy projects, and clearly there's a will from both the U.S. and Canada to drop down some regulation to help those energy projects. We saw the memorandum between the federal government and the Alberta government, I think a few weeks ago.

All of things that point to more favorable conditions for a company like Enbridge and oil producers, which will need to use those, that infrastructure. So that is always going to be a bit of an issue here just because it's not specific to Enbridge. It's just these are highly levered businesses, but then again, they do have pretty stable cash flows. So that's the gist of it for it, for me for Anbridge. How about you? Yeah, I think they've been derisking quite a bit and becoming more of, you know, a regulated utility than they were prior. I mean, a lot of these pipelines have take or pay contracts, which means, I mean, even if they aren't pushing, you know, whatever they're pushing through the pipelines, whether it be natural gas or oil, they still get paid. So it is a great business model.

I mean, the more regulated aspect of it probably means slower growing, but probably means more reliable income. The debt levels for me would push it out of, definitely out of S. I mean, it's just too leveraged. They tend to struggle. I think they struggled over the, over COVID. But, I mean, there's still amazing business models. There's no doubt. I'd probably put them in the B tier just because it's going to be, there's going to be a cap on growth for them.

Yes, there's going to be some growth. But then again, they're not going to benefit from higher commodity prices as a natural producer. would. They will benefit from it, but there's just a cap on the amount of benefit that they'll get from that. So for me, it would be more like in the B tier type of deal. Yeah. Let's do that. 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 slash host. 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. The next one on the list here, the first, the biggest, of the mining companies in Canada. So, Barry Gold, an interesting play, not my personal preferred play to play the commodity and especially precious metal.

So right now, their latest quarter, they had a 1538 all-in cost per ounce, AISC. I'm missing the S-A-Cron, the letter there, but essentially. Sustainable costs. All in sustainable cost per ounce of gold in the latest quarter. Of course, lower is better here. And there are other gold producers here or miners that you'll see they actually have a lower cost per ounce than bear gold. Has a large stake in a U.S. mine and exposure to other jurisdiction like Dominican Republic and some African countries. That's important because with miners, you definitely want to see where those mines are.

how diversified they are, is there some political or geopolitical risk associated with that? We saw it with a crowberry Panama. What can happen when you're overly reliant in a mine in a country that may not be as stable? What that can do for production? So that's just a quick, a few quick notes here for Barrett Gold. Yeah, so they have a 50-50 joint partnership, the Pakistani government in pretty much one of the largest, I think it's the largest copper deposits in the world. So it's expected to be 70 plus billion in lifetime cash flow.

I think there's a ton of infrastructure and financing issues. But I mean, it's still very interesting. I mean, political, it gets through the roof for that one, right? Yeah, through the roof, which is why, like, I mean, this is obviously my opinion, but most of the miners, I think will fall in, I mean, D tier max. Yeah. Just because of the business model, like, if you think. Yeah, I was thinking C or D.

So I'll let you have this one since I kind of won for Royals. So do you want C or D for Barrick? I would go D. I mean, if you think about like, obviously there's... I like some of the other ones better than Barrick. Yeah, there's the saying that when a gold rush, the only people that ever make money are the picks and shovels, which kind of gives you the indication. Like the miners over the long term are generally not very good businesses. They're too cyclical.

Obviously, over the last year or two, they've done very well. but it's very difficult for them to sustain it over the long term. Like I think Barrick from 2010 to like 2020 was dead money, like 10 years of pretty much dead money. So I'll put it in D tier here. Now the next one on the list, the next big bang. So BMO, by the way, just of course people would know by now, and you probably hear the ads,

but we do have BMO ETF as one of our sponsors. So keep that in mind. Again, I haven't looked at BMO all that much recently, but it is another Canadian Bank that will be heavily dependent on the Canadian economy. It's not as well diversified as a royal, for example. And of course, they're doing definitely some good things, I think, on the asset management side, which of course includes BMO ETF. But I would probably put it, personally, I think I would put it above TD below Royal, but

I'll let you talk before we decide. I would agree. I would say like with TD's asset cap, it's probably if you want like U.S. exposure, it would be probably your best bet now. I know they. Yeah. With that BMO Nesbit, right? Yeah.

And they did that Bank of the West acquisition, which they're, that's right. They're kind of trying to turn into like a California play, I think. Like they're kind of moving a lot of assets there. But I go, yeah, B tier. I mean, it's going to be, again, it's going to be hard to put any bank even at level with Royal, because it's just it's done so well but okay well next on the list actually we have three banks in a row here bank of nova scot so ticker bns bMO the ticker i believe is bMO obviously um yeah looking the show notes we'll put all the tickers here another canadian bank well the biggest issue

here were some decision of expansions that they did in latin america i think it was about 10 years ago roughly now that just didn't pan out as well as they wanted i think now they're trying to focus more on the Canadian side of the thing, but it has dragged results a bit for Bank of Nova Scotia. And I think it's also one of the reason why their provisions for credit losses are on the higher end compared to some of the other banks. So just a few notes here. I'll let you talk and then we can agree on the ranking.

Yeah, I think they like their PCL ratio in Latin America is like almost 150 basis points, I think. And like most of the banks like in the Canadian arms. say it's like 40. So like that area is has been a struggle. I mean, now they're they pretty much said that area. I mean, I don't want to say they said it was dead, but it kind of is. They're, they're kind of calling at the North American corridor where they're kind of pushing harder here. I mean, it would be, you can't rank it. I probably put it around TD for me. I think I'd put in this C tier. Yeah, I would. Just because they've shown, if it hadn't shown like a bit

of a rebound over the last two or three quarters, I would put a D tier because it has been a very poor performing bank, but I think C is pretty appropriate. If TD didn't have that asset cap, it's probably ahead, but I think they're pretty yeah. Yeah, exactly. Okay, that's good. The next one here, another Canadian bank, like I said, so BNS, the tickers BNS, CIBC here. CIM. CBC, the biggest issue, again, it's a Canadian bank. So they're always, they're all going to have like, the retail, Canadian and commercial business is all going to be fairly similar with some differences, of course. Canadian real estate exposure here as a percentage of total loans is the highest of all the banks. Now, of course, RBC is much larger. They do have more exposure in dollar

value, but as a percentage of those loans, if you include heat locks, it's actually around 53% when I check doing those notes. So it's still the highest. It's been very high. You're also taking into account that we're getting that renewal wall, all these cheap interest rate mortgages that were taken out in 2021. That five years is coming up right now and next year. And early 2027, because the rate high isn't, didn't start until mid 2020 in the spring of 2022. So I think CIBC, that's why I get a little bit nervous with them. Yeah, I mean, it would be, it would be the last Canadian bank that I would own, which is pretty crazy because it's done so well over the last while, but it would be the last one I'd buy just because of that Canadian exposure. I mean, it's expanding more in the

United States now. And it was kind of a bank that was like price for disaster up until like the last, I would say, 18 months. And obviously disaster hasn't come. So it's done very well. But I mean, I put them honestly, the more we've talked about TD and them. Like I if we, if I'd revise it, I'd probably put CIBC and TD and D. Yeah. I mean, I was going to say CIBC would be a D. Which again, like a lot of people probably think we're crazy just because of how well they've done but it's just like again it's like the business concentration yeah yeah so do you agree TD because of the AML stuff downgrade to D we could downgrade it okay yeah it just the uncertainty right like maybe we look at this in a year from now two years the cap in the US is removed and then I'd have a different

a year would be crazy yeah exactly and keep in mind those regulators in the US not to hammer back on TD, like they are facing higher costs because they have to be extremely compliant and those that cost of being compliant is expensive. So it's going to put pressure on those margins in the US business too. Now the next one, another minor, number 10 on the list, an eco-eco. So clearly one of a much better play in my opinion, I think it would be of all the miners here, excluding the streamers. I think it's probably the best precious metal miner. that we have on this list. So they have a 1373 all-in sustainable costs. And if you remember here talking about Barrick, they were at 1538. And this is the latest quarter as well for them.

Pretty impressive that it's that much, you know, what, 12, 13% lower than a Barrick gold. And on top of that, their biggest minds are all located in what I would consider safer jurisdictions to operate in. and you're thinking mostly Canada and Australia compared to some of the locations of Verra Gold. Yeah, so I would say the actual, like Agneco, I would say is the best producer. I mean, there's obviously like a huge safety premium here. So it's like, like it's very expensive. It's like tech stock multiples almost for a gold miner.

I would say most of their success was actually coming from when they bought Kirkland gold, which is, you know, Kirkland had those, you know, safe Canadian jurisdictions. Kirkland was one I own and I ended up selling Agneco a few years. ago, but best gold producer, but I would still, like, probably see just because the... Really? I'd put them as B, yeah, because we put Berek. The business model itself is so cyclical. No, yeah, it is definitely true, but just the fact that they seem to manage it better, but... They do. I'll give this one to you, whatever you want to be. Okay. Okay, sounds good. The next one, we're not sure you'll get it. So let's do it, Nico, just because we have another one.

one, another minor in the list, a pure minor, that I think will be a good fit in the C. So that's that. I'm kind of thinking strategic here. So next one on the list here, this one I had to do a little bit of digging, Thompson Roiders, or however, Reuters. I didn't really fully know their whole like business lines until I started digging a little bit for this. And of course, they're known for the news arm. Yeah.

Pretty well known for that. But most of their revenue actually comes from what they're called their big three data sources, which are legal, corporate, and tax slash accounting. And essentially they provide data to like law firms, corporation, really important. But the, and really essential data, but the big question surrounding them, and I think a big reason why the stock is down like 30, 40 percent in the past year, is how potentially they could be disrupted by AI. Yeah. So Thompson Reuters, a lot of people just think of the website. Yeah, like Reuters, but they really, what they do is they just sell data. So like if you're a lawyer, like you pay a subscription and you get access to all this proprietary data that they own that you like couldn't source from an LLM. Like a lawyer couldn't go to chat GPT and find any of the case study data that like Thompson Reuters has on a particular situation. And there is a lot of worries about AI like overtaking this business. But first off, I don't think.

so because first they own the data it's not access like it's not accessible and secondly like you think of lawyers accountants they're not making six or seven figure decisions off some l lm like they're going to you know utilize the data it would be close to an s tier for me like it's it's it's been like one of the better operated businesses oh no i don't think so it's like i would probably go a it's kind of a genius business model i mean recurring revenue is vast majority of the business and I think like you know the big three

still kind of grow at a double digit pace and I mean the margins are pretty good too I think operating margins are like 30%. I think B would be an insult. I think it's got to be higher. That's fine. I'll let you have that one. Let's go A. I do wonder though for I get what you're saying

for the AI disruption but we've seen these models get so good and I can just see a startup company trying to leverage AI to be able to offer some alternatives to that at a much lower cost. So that's where it's possible, but I don't see, I don't see like the companies that Tom's Reuters deals with biting on that. Because again, like they've collected this data for decades.

It's like proprietary data that they own. Like the, the mode is huge, I think. It's very expensive because of this. And now obviously very similar situation to Constellation. Like a lot of people think AI is going to kind of take it over. But I think a borderline. an S, I would say. Okay, so that's fine.

We'll agree on A. So the next one on the list, another in the mining space, but not a miner. So this is Weithen Precious Metal, WPM, I believe is the ticker. Largest precious metal streaming company in North America, in case people warn the wear, it's actually larger market cab than Franco, Nevada. Their cost per GEO, so gold equivalent ounces. And this is a streamer. Essentially, what they'll do is they'll finance these junior miners.

They'll do a bunch of different financing deal. And in exchange for that financing, they'll be able to purchase precious metals, typically gold, silver, and others at a much discounted rate. So the geo means that essentially the cause that they're paying for these ounces of gold and its equivalent ounces, just a standard unit. That's why they use that because they get other metals than just gold, while it's $532 in the latest quarter. And keep in mind that gold is currently above 4,300 USD.

So that's why it's such a genius business model. I don't hold Wheaton, but I am thinking to probably just do a bucket approach between and trim my Franco and just do a bucket approach between them and Weath and precious metal. They have no debt, substantial cash position. as well. A lot to like. They are more of a streaming company versus Franco Nevada that we'll talk about, which does a bit of both streaming and royalties. Oh, yes, because I was going to go over the royalty side, but I'll leave that for Franco. Yeah, I mean, these are, I mean, I think in like the precious metal area, they're probably like, in my opinion, they only buy and holds, kind of the ones that

you can kind of leave, whereas the miners, again, you just have such boom bust. You kind of have to try and time the cycles. I think Wheaton is kind of pure precious metal, whereas Franko, Ranko has a bit of oil and gas exposure, I think. But I'd be B tiering it, potentially A tiering it. Yeah, I'm like these two companies and spoiler alert, I probably put them in A or S. But we can put, we can do A, just because I think the business model, obviously it's still going to be dependent on the prices of the commodities that are produced. But like I always tell people, trading at 4,300, cut that price in half.

they're still super profitable. Yeah. Of course, the stock price is going to take a big hit. Don't get me wrong. But in terms of business models, I think it does not get much better than that. So let's do you. You took Thompson. I'll take this one.

I'll do a. The reason I say A is because I have S reserved for another one. Okay, that's right. That's fair. Spoiler. Yeah. Spoiler alert. Constellation software.

So one, that all the full disclosure here, we both own. So we're both shareholder of consolation. This one, I think for me, the track record is there. I think there is some uncertainty going forward, of course, with the new CEO, but he's said all the right things. Mark Leonard is stepping down for health reasons, but is remaining on the board, and we don't really know the full extent of the health reasons, of course.

And of course, there are some potential disruption risk because it owns thousands of companies, right, that could be disrupted or helped by AI. We don't really know. There is some risk associated with that, but the track record is also there and they've shown a propensity of doing some very good capital allocation. Yeah, so I own this one. I think we both own it. Yeah.

Yeah, we both. Yeah. I mean, before the issues, like before Leonard resigning, I mean, I think you S tier this all day, but there is like, I kind of talked about Thompson Reuters, how like I think it's, you know, very, very little chance AI disrupts it. I think Constellation is probably a bit bigger of a chance. I still think it's very, very low. I think they're actually going to leverage AI to actually increase like ARPUs and actually drive more revenue. But I think with Leonard resigning and the potential for disruption, I think you probably

got an A tier it. Yeah, I was thinking that too. Yeah. 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. 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 slash host. 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. And then we're going on to the first oil producer. Not the first energy company, because our Ambridge would be that first one,

but the largest oil producer, I guess, in Canada, in terms of market cap at the very least, Canadian Natural Resources. It's one that I own. The biggest argument here, I think, for Canadian National Resources is that their break-even cost is in the low to mid-40s in terms of USD dollar per barrel. so what that means is they can essentially keep paying that dividend they have enough profit even if prices of oil go are in the 50s of course they're not generating as much that if prices were in the 60s 70s 80s 90s whatever it is but definitely a really solid business if you're okay with the cyclicality associated with that but you get you always get a pretty big chunk of your return via dividends with them Yeah, I think back during COVID, like they raised the dividend, like when oil was when it went through, you know, you know, into the floor. Like I think it was like negative for a certain amount of portion.

Like they actually ended up raising the dividend whereas something like Suncor ended up cutting it. So I mean, I think it's probably the best in class oil producer, although Imperial has kind of stepped up its game and it's definitely getting up there. But I mean, if I'm going to B tier Agniko, I probably got a B tier Canadian natural. just because again the business model is no no i i uh yeah it's just too focused on commodity prices which are generally boom and bus which leads to generally boom and bus returns okay so we're going to beat here it i'm realizing it that uh i didn't even have it to put on the slides so i have to add it that's okay well yeah so beat here you want to do the next one on the list the last one here while I get the logo and add it to the list here.

Yeah, so we're doing Canadian Pacific Kansas City. So this is pretty much like prior to a few years ago, it would have been kind of lockstep with CN Rail, but they made the acquisition of Kansas City Southern, which made it the only railway interconnecting Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. So shipments that, you know, generally would have had to change rail lines, maybe companies, etc. can now kind of be transported seamlessly. So it's hard to imagine this doesn't kind of help the margin profile in the future. Obviously, these are going to be companies that are cyclical as well.

But the only difficulty with, or sorry, the only benefit of this would be that when freight volumes return, there's very little, there's very few businesses they can go to. So they, effectively, the mo is impenetrable, I guess. Like, I mean, if you think of it costs, you know, one, one and a half million dollars, I think for a month. mile of flat railroad track it's they can't be matched now the thing is like you're not like the market prices this in so you're not getting any sort of benefit from this but um yeah go ahead and then we'll think of a tier yeah so Canadian Pacific I don't have too much to add with the Kansas City Southern acquisition I mean I think you can't really argue they have the best network of all the railways in North America it's that simple it goes from coast to coast in Canada and

goes all the way to Mexico and there's a lot of of exposure in the U.S. as well. So Canadian Natural Railway has a pretty good network as well, but I think Canadian Pacific is up there. And obviously, I know you own it. It is on my radar too. So for that one, I probably would put it, sorry, S or A, like it's really up there.

Obviously it's going to, maybe because there is some cyclicality because it is more tied to the economy. Maybe I go in the A tier just because of that. What do you think? What do you say that? I would go A, kind of, it's pretty close to S. I mean, again, like a lot of people might not think this because of how poorly the railroads have done recently. But, I mean, if you look to historical returns, like, they've, it's crazy how well they've done.

So without a little bit of recency bias, you would probably, you know, be between the S and A for sure. Okay. So that is the first half of the 15 names. I'll just recap them quickly. So the only one in the S-tier so far is Shopify. Then A-tier, we have RBC, we have Brookfield, we have Thompson-Royders, Weathen precious metal, consolation software, Canadian Pacific, Kansas City, Southern, or Kansas City, I guess, KC, B-Tier, Enbridge, BMO, Agneco Eagle,

Canadian Natural Resources, C-Tier, Scotia Bank, sitting lonely in the C-Tier, and then D, we have Barrick, C-IBC, N-T-D-S. So come back for the next episode, which we'll be finishing our ranking here. So we'll go down from 16 to number 30. And we'll probably wrap up the episode on the next one, just to leave people guessing a little bit on some names that we were surprised were not in the 30 largest companies in Canada. We were actually talking about that before we started recording.

So hopefully you enjoy this episode. I know you're listening to this in the new year. We recorded this on December. 17, so it's very possible that things have changed a little bit in terms of market cap. But let us know if you agree or not. Obviously, this is very subjective on our part. But I've been fun to do, looking forward to the second part here. Yeah.

And I guess the one thing that I would say is like even if we have the companies in a lower tier, it doesn't mean they're bad companies. Like, again, we just went from a business model perspective overall. That's it. Yeah. And it's our opinion. And again, a business, you can have barrack, C, IBCTD, vastly off. form Shopify or only business in the S tier, right?

It doesn't mean that we put in a certain tier that it may be a good or bad investment. We're just talking about it from a purely business standpoint here. Not even, I know we mentioned a few times valuation, but we're like essentially not even thinking about the valuation when we're, yeah, outside of that. We're just looking at quality of business. Yeah, I mean, before the AML issues, I would have probably a tiered TD. So yeah, it's, it's, there's a lot of different, you know, aspects here. but yeah and before we get going so if you've listened to this at the end we are looking to doing a special

and adding these episodes the full episodes to youtube typically they're only on joint tCI join tc i will have the early release of course but we will be looking probably this one will be on your stock trades dot c channel dan and then the part two will be on r t canadian investor channel so i'll put the link in the show notes for both channels so if you're not subscribed to either of them make sure you do because you won't need to be subscribed to join TCI to be able to see those. Probably a good thing to have in terms of visuals. And I'm just trying to viewing mode here, trying to do like a full screen, but I'm not used to this one. But I think this is pretty visible, right?

Yeah, people. You can modify it too, yeah. Yeah, Ma, just trying to make it a bit bigger. But whatever, I'm not used to the PowerPoint, the slides from Google. So hopefully enjoy this. Again, you're listening to this in the new year. Happy New Year to everyone. Hopefully, 2026 is as good for investing than 2025, 24, and 23. So thanks again for listening and we will be back on Monday or Thursday. Not quite sure of the schedule just yet, but the next Monday or

Thursday, whichever one, comes first with part two. 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.