“Undue expansion.” That was the ruling from Canada’s Dept of Finance on Colabor Income Fund’s (TSX: CLB-U, OTC: COLAF) takeover of rival food services firm Summit Food Service Distributors. As a result, Colabor became the first trust subjected to the tax on specified investment flow-through entities (SIFT) Read More

Slumping natural gas prices, restrictions on new capital resulting from prospective 2011 taxation, the spiking Canadian dollar and finally the US economic slowdown: Trusts that survived and thrived during those stress tests last year are literally ready for anything 2008 can throw at them. Read More

Is Canada’s Conservative Party starting to triangulate on trusts? Last month, the government rolled back the restrictions on foreign investment for REITs imposed by last year’s Tax Fairness Act. That ensures that virtually all will qualify for favorable tax status in 2011 and beyond, and it opens a new avenue for growth as well. Read More

Two-thirds of the trusts in the Canadian Edge universe yield double digits or better. Three-quarters produce enough cash flow to cover their generous distributions by a comfortable margin. Thirty-seven trusts—or more than a third—have raised dividends at least once since Halloween 2006. And four out of every five sell for less than 1.5 times book value and/or a discount to annual sales. Read More

Buy and hold good businesses: That was my initial advice for Canadian Edge readers following the Halloween 2006 “massacre,” when the Conservative Party government shocked the market by announcing income trusts would be taxed as corporations beginning in 2011   Read More

Natural gas lags while oil soars. Some trusts win high-premium takeover bids, while others collapse following sharp dividend cuts. The rising Canadian dollar lifts share prices and dividends, yet pulls the rug out from under some trusts’ businesses. Read More

The investing public hasn’t really caught on yet. But the threat of a global credit crunch spurred by US mortgage mayhem is already diminishing rapidly. Read More