For those who attend investment seminars wanting to hear the speaker’s best five stock tips, this week’s presentation by portfolio managers at Sionna Investment Managers will have been disappointing. But for those who wanted to learn how a value manager goes about its craft, about how decisions are made at what must be the country’s most diverse money management firm, the event was a winner.
Low interest rates and losses in the energy sector are putting downward pressure on the shares of large lifecos. These solid companies could offer investing opportunities.
Recent volatile markets and accompanying daily negative news headlines are a constant reminder of just how much noise exists. Not all negative news is noise though. When there’s a fundamental change in an industry or a specific company, we need to listen and update our views accordingly. The challenge is to distinguish potential distractions from relevant information.
The topic of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investing is one that continues to gain in popularity. ESG investing can have different meanings to individual investors, and ESG principles can be incorporated into investment processes in a multitude of ways. At Sionna, we thought it would be worthwhile to share our interpretation of ESG principles and how we apply them to our research process.
At Sionna, we go by the philosophy that it is better to know what may be hiding around the corner – this way you don’t panic and, in the investing world, you can prepare yourself so you don’t react irrationally. We know that markets are unpredictable, however the more informed we are, the better we can rationally respond to unanticipated events.
There is a fair chance that Imperial Oil, which reported its third quarter financials Friday, is etched in the mind of Kim Shannon, founder and chief investment officer at Sionna Investment Managers.
I had had the chance to catch Kim Shannon speak the year before at a RAMA event. She had just published her book, The Value Proposition, which had brought a packed audience of faculty, alumni and industry insiders. The speech explained her incredibly unique approach to value investing. Her sensitivity to the Canadian market had allowed her to abandon the pure-blood value investing approach in favour of her own “relative value” method, which accounted for a country overweight in cyclical stocks.
With the number of buybacks hitting record-breaking highs, share repurchases have increasingly become a popular topic on the news. Many commentators argue that the surge in buyback activity was an impending sign that the market was set for a correction. History, and recent market weakness, tells us that there may be some truth to this belief.
Katie joined Sionna’s relationship management team in 2015 as Marketing Manager. Prior to joining Sionna, Katie was an Account Supervisor at a marketing and communications agency, primarily working with clients in the financial services industry. She earned her Honours Bachelor of Commerce degree from the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University and after graduating, Katie spent several months volunteering at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and Paralympics. She holds the Chartered Investment Manager (CIM®) designation.
Unlike the hordes of sellers who seemingly wanted out at any price, two of the country’s best-known value investment managers – Prem Watsa from Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. and Kim Shannon from Sionna Investment Managers Inc. – were spectators to the dramatic turn in global stock markets on Monday.