Building a Case for Marijuana Stocks

The Sunday Investor Week 47: Ending November 20, 2020 S&P/TSX Composite Index Recap By The Sunday Investor

The S&P/TSX Composite Index gained 343 points, or 2.06% to close above 17K for the first time in nine months. Energy stocks continued their strong recovery with an average gain of 8.48%, while Financials also did well with a 3.90% gain. Defensive sectors Materials (-1.56%), Consumer Staples (-1.35%) and Utilities (-0.28%) were the biggest losers, which is more of a reflection of market enthusiasm as opposed to any real problems with these stocks. A surprise for me this week was in the Technology sector as all 11 stocks were in the green including Shopify (7.43%), Lightspeed POS (14.80%) and even Blackberry (12.35%). Despite the strong performance of index leaders, the S&P/TSX equal weight index advanced even more as the average stock gained 2.72% compared to the index’s 2.06% gain. How I wish Horizons didn’t shut down this ETF.

The price of U.S. WTI Crude Oil gained $2.29 to close at $42.42 while the discount on Western Canadian Select spiked from $9 to around $12 as WCS closed at $30.66. The Canadian – U.S. dollar pair gained 0.28% and is now down 0.79% year to date. Gold dropped $19 to close at $1,870. Volatility lowered from the previous two weeks but still remains in elevated territory with the standard deviation of returns coming in at 6.40%. Now that we have two promising vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, the efficient delivery seems to be the next logical important step. Some countries will do it better than others, so keep that in mind if you plan on doing some trading over the next few months. Thanks for reading and enjoy the newsletter! WEEKLY RETURN & RISK BY SECTOR

Returns are calculated as a simple average, not based on market-capitalization. Risk is considered to be population standard deviation of returns.

10.00%

8.00%

6.00%

4.00%

2.00%

0.00%

-2.00%

Energy

Utilities

Materials

Industrials

Real EstateReal Technology

-4.00% Care Health

Financial Services Financial

Consumer Staples Consumer

Consumer Cyclical Consumer Communication Services Communication

Return Standard Deviation MARIJUANA STOCKS: TRYING (HARD) TO BUILD A CASE

ambiguity aversion bias

HMMJ

Revenue in $USD Millions Weight 2016 2017 2018 2019 TTM Canopy Growth 17.30% 10 30 60 169 359 Cronos Group 12.57% 0 3 12 24 37 Innovative Industrial Properties 12.15% 1 6 15 45 98 GW Pharmaceuticals 11.80% 13 9 15 311 488 Aphria 11.79% 6 15 29 175 430 Scotts Miracle-Gro 9.35% 2,506 2,642 2,663 3,156 4,132 Tilray 4.42% 13 21 42 154 183 Charlottes Web Holdings 4.39% 15 40 70 95 91 Aurora Cannabis 2.38% 1 14 42 188 205 Village Farms 2.30% 156 158 150 145 156 Operating Margins Weight 2016 2017 2018 2019 TTM Canopy Growth 17.30% -10% -17% -149% -271% -170% Cronos Group 12.57% -400% -197% -176% -503% -495% Innovative Industrial Properties 12.15% -260% -2% 36% 56% 59% GW Pharmaceuticals 11.80% -1013% -1933% -1971% -38% -10% Aphria 11.79% -13% 11% -20% -27% 4% Scotts Miracle-Gro 9.35% 16% 16% 13% 13% 15% Tilray 4.42% -56% -37% -137% -135% -127% Charlottes Web Holdings 4.39% 7% 30% 23% -26% -68% Aurora Cannabis 2.38% -318% -53% -145% -123% -164% Village Farms 2.30% 0% -2% -4% -20% -10% Innovative Key Metric Industrial GW Pharma Aphria Scotts Miracle-Gro Properties Gross Profit Margin 95.58% 92.95% 39.19% 32.99% EBITDA Margin 82.40% -7.74% 12.91% 16.86% Net Income Margin 55.71% -11.05% -18.93% 9.38% Levered FCF Margin 88.29% -11.57% -41.30% 15.40% Return on Equity 6.31% -7.42% -5.89% 54.26% Cash From Operations 96.43M -49.26M -137.25M 558.00M Total Debt 137.29M 39.95M 325.64M 1.52B Total Debt to Equity 10.81 5.44 22.95 216.46 Long Term Debt 136.17M 8.49M 305.89M 1.46B Current Ratio 5.81 5.13 5.37 1.28 Book Value Per Share 56.64 23.15 2.2 -9.33 Debt/Free Cash Flow 1.58 -0.15 -1.76 2.29 Long Term Debt/Capital 9.75% 4.30% 17.79% 65.42% LAST WEEK’S ECONOMIC NUMBERS A quick summary of the most important economic releases for the week.

CPI Crude Oil Inventories U.S. crude oil inventories rose by Canadian Core CPI rose 0.768 million on a forecasted rise 0.4% in October and 1% Manufacturing U.S. Retail Sales of 1.65 million. This lower-than- on a year-over-year Canadian Manufacturing Sales U.S. retail sales missed expected rise was bullish for basis. Total CPI, which met the forecasted increase of expectations last week, up just energy stocks last week. includes food and 1.5% month-over-month in 0.3% on a monthly basis vs. a energy price changes, September, helping the 0.5% forecasted increase. Core grew 0.4% vs. last Canadian dollar’s rise last week. retail sales, which excludes month’s 0.1% decrease. auto sales, were up just 0.2%. UPCOMING EARNINGS RELEASES Earnings season is winding down, but still a few big names left to report!

ALIMENTATION COUCHE-TARD Alimentation Couche-Tard is due to release its quarterly earnings report on November 24. Analysts are expecting EPS of 0.67. BEST BUY Best Buy is due to release its quarterly earnings report on November 24. Analysts are expecting EPS of 1.70.

DOLLAR TREE Dollar Tree is due to release its quarterly earnings report on November 24. Analysts are expecting EPS of 1.15.

DEERE & COMPANY Deere & Company is due to release its quarterly earnings report on November 25. Analysts are expecting EPS of 1.38. TRACK MY CANADIAN EQUITY PORTFOLIO Low risk. Better returns than Index Investing.

YEAR-TO-DATE MID-TIER STOCKS

My portfolio is up 4.72% year-to-date compared with the With a higher concentration of Energy and Airline benchmark ETF’s iShares S&P/TSX Capped Composite stocks, this group is looking to get back into (XIC) 2.31% for an outperformance of 2.40%. recovery mode and is slightly trailing the Index, down an average of 0.05% for the year (or -1.99% weighted average). CORE STOCKS SPECULATIVE STOCKS Weighted at 58% of my portfolio, these ten stocks include Metro, Canadian Apartment Properties REIT, This group of stocks are weighted at 2% or less of Boyd Group, Fortis, and Franco-Nevada Gold. This group the total portfolio and make up just over 11% of of stocks are up 10.09% on average this year (9.19% the total. YTD they are down an average of 0.76% weighted average). (or a weighted-average loss of 0.19%)

For a complete weekly tracker, go to www.thesundayinvestor.ca/portfolio-tracker WEEKLY STOCK RETURNS

The next section includes the weekly returns for all ~230 S&P/TSX Composite Index stocks. I have organized the stocks by sector and included their ticker and industry as well.

Scroll through the lists and check out how your holdings performed in comparison to their competitors. For a more interactive version, check out the Subscribers Area on The Sunday Investor website and download the Weekly Tracker file which includes the weekly stock returns for all of this year. Communication Services

Symbol Company Industry Return BCE BCE Telecom Services 1.32% CCA Cogeco Communications Telecom Services 3.00% CJR.B Corus Entertainment Media - Diversified 1.22% QBR.B Quebecor Telecom Services -0.67% RCI.B Rogers Communications Telecom Services -0.22% SJR.B Shaw Communications Telecom Services 0.66% T TELUS Telecom Services -0.73% Consumer Cyclical