One of the founders of Alimentation Couche-Tard sold nearly $15 million in shares of the Laval convenience store chain this week.
Réal Plourde sold a total of 200,000 shares during the Wednesday and Thursday sessions. Transactions were made at prices ranging between $73 and $75. He is still a member of the board of directors and remains one of the company’s largest shareholders.
Last month, one of his fellow founders (Richard Fortin) also sold an equivalent block of Couche-Tard shares.
Stella-Jones gained additional support earlier this week. National Bank Financial now recommends purchasing the shares of the Montreal manufacturer of telephone poles and railway ties. Analyst Maxim Sytchev believes that upcoming infrastructure spending has significant upside potential for the stock. He also makes his mea culpa by admitting to having been too quick to withdraw his purchase suggestion in January. The stock is up 40% this year. There are now six out of seven analysts who suggest buying. The only one not suggesting the stock is the CIBC analyst.
Préfontaine Capital reduced its exposure to SNC-Lavalin (AtkinsRéalis) in September as the recent stock market surge reduced what the Montreal asset manager calls its margin of safety. “SNC-Lavalin is a situation that has required a lot of patience from us since our first purchases in the summer of 2019,” comments portfolio manager Stéphane Préfontaine in his quarterly letter published this week. “At the time of our purchases, the news feed was extremely negative for SNC-Lavalin. The company restructured and now the sky is brightening for its business, but we made virtually no return for about three years after our first purchases. SNC-Lavalin retains good potential with its nuclear division, but executives will need to prove they can continue to execute the financial and operational turnaround to justify the current price. »
The purchase offer of $2.90 per share proposed by a Boston company and accepted by OpSens management is rather low in the eyes of analyst Rahul Sarugaser of the Raymond James firm. According to him, the right price to buy the Quebec medical technology company is more between $3.50 and $4.00 per share.
The executive chairman of the board of directors of Tecsys has just sold approximately $275,000 worth of shares in the Montreal-based supplier of supply chain management software. Dave Brereton sold a total of 10,200 shares during Tuesday and Wednesday’s sessions.
GDI could well be the next Quebec public company to leave the stock market, according to National Bank Financial, which published its list of potential candidates for a capital closure on Thursday. The company specializing in building management and maintenance has certainly become more attractive to a buyer – a private investment firm, for example – given the approximately 35% decline in its stock market value since its pandemic peak reached in 2021.
The Canadian stock market continues to offer an attractive relative valuation based on its price-to-earnings ratio and dividend yield, and the telecommunications sector is a promising segment, according to strategist Sébastien McMahon of iA Global Management. ‘assets. “Utilities and banks, which have strong revenue bases and generous distributions, also offer a lot of value at current prices,” he says in his monthly commentary published this week. In the United States, he points out that high valuations limit the upside potential of technology stocks. He recommends taking profits and turning to the money market, energy or more defensive sectors like utilities or consumer staples.
A senior executive from AYA Or
The Quebec stocks of Coveo, Dollarama, WSP, Alimentation Couche-Tard, H2O Innovation and OpSens hit a 52-week high this week on the Toronto Stock Exchange. On the other hand, that of Transcontinental slipped this week to a new low of the last 52 weeks.