Bank of Motreal

[KeithD]

The Bank of Montreal (BMO) is one of Canada's biggest banks and is one of only a few in the Western world that has managed to find growth during these bad years.

The reason for this is likely that it only plays mainly in the Canadian market, and does not spread itself anywhere else.

Revenues grew last year by over 17%, so when you hear your government saying the banking sector is still finding it tough, it's more to do with the way they operate.

[cannew]

Just for information, BMO was established in 1817 and is the longest running dividend paying company in Canada.

Any of the six banks should be in one's CDN core holdings of stocks. They traditionally increased their dividend each year by 8%-10%. During the financial crisis they stopped the increases (actually the gov't would not allow them to re-install the dividends for awhile) but none of the banks cut their dividend.

BMO also purchased a US bank in 2011 I believe which it now calls BMO Harris.

I own BMO, BNS, NA, RY & CM and increased my holdings in each during 2009. With div reinvestment I'm way ahead even though the price of each is not at the prior peaks.

[ronn38]

I have BMO, BNS and CM are all on my watch list--haven't decided on a buy price yet for BMO... any thoughts?

Ronn

[cannew]

BMO has been the slowest to increase it's dividend, 2.9% 2012, 2.8% 2013. I like NA because they've had the quickest and highest dividend growth,14% 2011, 11% 2012, 9.9% 2013 second BNS 6.1% 2011, 9.4% 2012, 8.6% 2013 (and they have more International investments), but both are still expensive.

[ronn38]

National Bank of Canada does look interesting. Is it traded on ghd nyse (I canonly find a CA ticker)?

[cannew]

Sorry just in cdn

[ChadR]

Reluctant to invest in Canadian stocks with the expiration of the dividend treaty. Also, I see Canada having a housing bubble that the US went through recently. Not sure if the bubble bursting up there will be as bad as it was here, but don't want to risk it.