Best & Worst Performers: December 2008

These are total returns, with dividends presumed to have been reinvested at the bid price on the ex-date. The list has been restricted to issues in the HIMIPref™ indices.

December, 2008
Issue Index DBRS Rating Monthly Performance Notes (“Now” means “December 31”)
BCE.PR.Z FixFloat Pfd-2(low) -23.35%  
BCE.PR.Y Ratchet Pfd-2(low) -22.73%  
BCE.PR.S FixFloat Pfd-2(low) -20.97%  
BCE.PR.R FixFloat Pfd-2(low) -19.35%  
BCE.PR.I FixFloat Pfd-2(low) -18.83%  
BNA.PR.B SplitShare Pfd-2(low) +31.21% Asset coverage of 1.8-:1 as of December 31 based on BAM.A at 18.55 and 2.4 BAM.A per preferred. Now with a pre-tax bid-YTW of 8.87% based on a bid of 20.01 and a hardMaturity 2016-3-25 at 25.00. Presumably helped out a lot by very favourable monthly retraction terms – estimated retraction price is now $21.77 based on an NAV of 44.52.
FTN.PR.A SplitShare Pfd-2(low)
Review Negative
+31.27% Asset coverage of 1.4-:1 as of December 15 according to the company, with an estimated NAV of 13.75 based on the change in XFN since then. Now with a pre-tax bid-YTW of 8.94% based on a bid of 8.16 and a hardMaturity 2015-12-1. Estimated retraction price of $8.70 with capital units offered at $4.50.
BAM.PR.K Floater Pfd-2(low) +34.66% Was the worst performer in November, with a return of -35.06%.
FFN.PR.A SplitShare Pfd-2(low)
Review Negative
+35.09% Was the fifth-worst performer in November, with a return of -25.48%. Asset coverage of 1.1+:1 as of December 15 according to the company; NAV now estimated as 11.63 based on change in XFN since then. Now with a pre-tax bid-YTW of 11.07% based on a bid of 7.56 and a hardMaturity 2014-12-1 at 10.00. Estimated retraction price of $8.19 with capital units offered at $2.97.
BAM.PR.B Floater Pfd-2(low) +37.05% Was the second-worst performer in November, with a return of -30.81%.

The December rankings are not as mysterious as the November rankings … three of the best performers are merely bouncing back from horrible performance last month, while the five worst performers are all BCE issues … reacting as one might expect to the death of the Teachers’ deal.

It is interesting to note that the BPP floaters – issued by BPO Properties, which never fails to irritate me – had a horrible month. Two of the three would have made the list had they been included in the indices (they are excluded on credit concerns) … and they are now trading roughly kinda call it even yield with the BAM floaters, ending (for now) the long-standing credit inversion. To continue the graphs given in that post:

Was somebody saying something about efficient markets?

One Response to “Best & Worst Performers: December 2008”

  1. […] ‘n’ down, up ‘n’ down … this was the best performer in December, second-worst in […]

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