Last updated by BM on October 21, 2025
Summary
Welcome to this week’s MP Market Review – your go-to source for insights and updates on the Canadian dividend growth companies we track on The List! While we’ve expanded our watchlists to include U.S. companies The List-USA, our Canadian lineup remains the cornerstone of our coaching approach.
Don’t miss out on exclusive newsletters and premium content that will help you sharpen your investing strategy. Explore it all at magicpants.substack.com.
Your journey to dividend growth mastery starts here – let’s dive in!
- Last week, dividend growth of The List stayed the same with an average return of +6.9% YTD (income).
- Last week, the price of The List was up from the previous week with an average return of +11.3% YTD (capital).
- Last week, there were no dividend announcements from companies on The List.
- Last week, there were no earnings reports from companies on The List.
- This week, one company from The List will report on earnings.
DGI Clipboard
“Never invest in any idea you can’t illustrate with a crayon.”
— Peter Lynch
The Retirement Plan You Can Write On A Napkin
Intro
One of the best parts of having a growing subscriber base is the conversations it creates. When people reach out, I get to hear what’s on their minds, their goals, their questions, and their fears.
Our Timely Ten article last week drew nearly 1,000 views. That tells me our dividend growth investing (DGI) strategy is connecting with many of you.
At the same time, I’ve noticed a familiar theme that always surfaces in markets like this. Some investors are feeling the pressure of “missing out” on the surge in tech and gold stocks and the index performance that comes with it.
That feeling is completely normal. Even the most disciplined long-term investors can find it difficult to stay the course when momentum runs hot. Add in calls from advisors touting short-term ETF performance, and the temptation to chase returns becomes very real.
For those who’ve followed my work for a while, you know my investing journey spans more than forty years. I’ve felt this same pull many times. But what has kept me grounded is a clear, repeatable plan. As I wrote years ago in my original “About” page when I began sharing and coaching this process:
“Many investors believe the best strategy is to chase maximum total return and then sell shares to fund their lifestyle. I tried that approach. It’s harder than it looks.
While you can create your own “dividends” by selling shares, it forces constant buying and selling. Over time, those transactions lead to timing errors, emotional decisions, and costly mistakes.
ETFs didn’t solve it either. They hold too many underperformers, which makes it mathematically impossible to beat the index they track. Over diversification may smooth the ride a little, but it doesn’t protect against losses.
My research eventually led me to dividend growth investing. Instead of selling assets, you collect and grow your income. Dividend growth investors focus on quality, ignore short-term price swings, and let rising dividends do the heavy lifting.
When your income grows steadily, your capital usually follows. That’s the power of cash flow over guesswork.”
Fast forward to today, I’ve taken this timeless concept and layered in some ideas of my own. I like to call it our DGI Napkin Plan, a simple idea with the power to change the way you think about retirement.
Here it is: Focus on high-quality dividend growth companies, buy them at sensible valuations, aim for an average 3% starting yield with at least 7% annual dividend growth, and hold. Initial yield plus dividend growth becomes your estimated capital growth rate.
The math is simple, but compounding turns simple into powerful. Here’s how it looks, starting with $100,000 or $1,000,000 of investment savings.
Source: Magic Pants Wealth-Builder Model Portfolio (CDN) Business Plan
Investing larger amounts of initial capital gets your investment snowball rolling much faster. Here’s an example projection for investing $1,000,000 using the same simple, disciplined DGI approach.
The only other requirement is that you contribute $12,000 per year starting in Year 2. That’s it. No timing the market. No complicated trades. Just a disciplined process that compounds quietly in the background.
If the $100K projection chart looks familiar, that’s because it is. It’s part of the business plan behind our public-facing model portfolios in both Canada and the United States. This is a proven, long-term approach that builds durable wealth decade after decade. It may not feel exciting in the short term, but time and compounding do the heavy lifting.
And here’s the real magic. Year ten isn’t the finish line. It’s just the point where the snowball really starts to accelerate. Both your income and capital keep growing well beyond that.
Takeaway
For many investors, the hardest part of the DGI journey is waiting for compounding to do its quiet work. If that’s you, consider setting up one or two separate investment buckets to channel that urge. Personally, I invest in real estate and precious metals outside my DGI portfolio. This allows me to stay disciplined with my core strategy while still exploring other opportunities on the side.
A word of caution, though: those other buckets often involve market timing and a very different skill set. That’s why, for most of us, DGI remains the most dependable, passive path to building wealth. It’s simple, but not always easy. And that’s exactly why it works.
Real wealth is built quietly, not quickly.
Become a paid partner, and I’ll show you exactly how I do it. With real money. In real stocks. In addition, gain full access to this post and exclusive, subscriber-only content. We do the work; you stay in control. Subscribe today and take your dividend growth investing to the next level!
DGI Scorecard
The List (2025)
The Magic Pants 2025 list includes 29 Canadian dividend growth stocks. Here are the criteria to be considered a candidate on ‘The List’:
- Dividend growth streak: 10 years or more.
- Market cap: Minimum one billion dollars.
- Diversification: Limit of five companies per sector, preferably two per industry.
- Cyclicality: Exclude REITs and pure-play energy companies due to high cyclicality.
Based on these criteria, companies are added or removed from ‘The List’ annually on January 1. Prices and dividends are updated weekly.
‘The List’ is not a portfolio but a coaching tool that helps us think about ideas and risk manage our model portfolio. We own some but not all the companies on ‘The List’. In other words, we might want to buy these companies when valuation looks attractive.
Our newsletter provides readers with a comprehensive insight into the implementation and advantages of our Canadian dividend growth investing strategy. This evidence-based, unbiased approach empowers DIY investors to outperform both actively managed dividend funds and passively managed indexes and dividend ETFs over longer-term horizons.
Performance of ‘The List’
Last week, dividend growth stayed the same, with an average return of +6.9% YTD (income).
The price of ‘The List’ was up from the previous week, with an average YTD return of +11.3% (capital).
Even though prices may fluctuate, the dependable growth in our income does not. Stay the course. You will be happy you did.
Last week’s best performers on ‘The List’ were TFII-N (TFII-N), up +9.27%.; Loblaw Companies Limited (L-T), up +4.74%; and Thomson Reuters (TRI-Q) up +4.70%.
Intact Financial (IFC-T) was the worst performer last week, down -4.07%.
| SYMBOL | COMPANY | YLD | PRICE | YTD % | DIV | YTD % | STREAK |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ATD-T | Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc. | 1.0% | $74.95 | -5.19% | $0.78 | 8.3% | 15 |
| BCE-T | Bell Canada | 8.4% | $33.99 | 1.40% | $2.87 | -28.1% | 16 |
| BIP-N | Brookfield Infrastructure Partners | 5.0% | $34.30 | 7.66% | $1.72 | 6.2% | 17 |
| CCL-B-T | CCL Industries Inc. | 1.7% | $77.31 | 5.01% | $1.28 | 10.3% | 23 |
| CNR-T | Canadian National Railway | 2.6% | $134.05 | -8.67% | $3.55 | 5.0% | 29 |
| CTC-A-T | Canadian Tire | 4.1% | $173.14 | 12.64% | $7.10 | 1.4% | 14 |
| CU-T | Canadian Utilities Limited | 4.6% | $39.73 | 14.23% | $1.83 | 1.0% | 53 |
| DOL-T | Dollarama Inc. | 0.2% | $182.97 | 30.51% | $0.41 | 18.1% | 14 |
| EMA-T | Emera | 4.2% | $69.10 | 29.09% | $2.92 | 1.2% | 18 |
| ENB-T | Enbridge Inc. | 5.7% | $65.98 | 6.64% | $3.77 | 3.0% | 29 |
| ENGH-T | Enghouse Systems Limited | 5.7% | $20.45 | -24.43% | $1.16 | 16.0% | 18 |
| FNV-N | Franco Nevada | 0.7% | $203.69 | 68.16% | $1.52 | 5.6% | 17 |
| FTS-T | Fortis Inc. | 3.4% | $72.47 | 21.55% | $2.46 | 3.1% | 51 |
| GSY-T | goeasy Ltd. | 3.7% | $159.40 | -4.64% | $5.84 | 24.8% | 10 |
| IFC-T | Intact Financial | 2.1% | $258.62 | -1.65% | $5.32 | 9.9% | 20 |
| L-T | Loblaw Companies Limited | 0.9% | $59.18 | 24.43% | $0.55 | 15.2% | 13 |
| MFC-T | Manulife Financial | 4.0% | $44.34 | 0.91% | $1.76 | 10.0% | 11 |
| MGA-N | Magna | 4.3% | $44.77 | 7.26% | $1.94 | 2.1% | 15 |
| MRU-T | Metro Inc. | 1.5% | $96.62 | 7.15% | $1.48 | 10.4% | 30 |
| RY-T | Royal Bank of Canada | 3.0% | $204.27 | 18.58% | $6.04 | 7.9% | 14 |
| SJ-T | Stella-Jones Inc. | 1.5% | $80.50 | 10.29% | $1.24 | 10.7% | 20 |
| STN-T | Stantec Inc. | 0.6% | $154.08 | 36.22% | $0.89 | 7.3% | 13 |
| T-T | Telus | 7.6% | $21.48 | 9.42% | $1.64 | 7.0% | 21 |
| TD-T | TD Bank | 3.8% | $111.06 | 45.18% | $4.20 | 2.9% | 14 |
| TFII-N | TFI International | 1.9% | $94.55 | -28.70% | $1.80 | 12.5% | 14 |
| TIH-T | Toromont Industries | 1.3% | $156.97 | 38.79% | $2.08 | 8.3% | 35 |
| TRI-Q | Thomson Reuters | 1.5% | $158.53 | -2.37% | $2.38 | 10.2% | 31 |
| TRP-T | TC Energy Corp. | 4.7% | $72.10 | 5.69% | $3.40 | 3.3% | 24 |
| WCN-N | Waste Connections | 0.7% | $172.97 | 1.80% | $1.26 | 7.7% | 15 |
| Averages | 3.1% | 11.3% | 6.9% | 21 |
Note: Stocks ending in “-N or -Q” declare earnings and dividends in US dollars. To achieve currency consistency between dividends and share price for these stocks, we have shown dividends in US dollars and share price in US dollars (these stocks are listed on a US exchange). The dividends for their Canadian counterparts (-T) would be converted into CDN dollars and would fluctuate with the exchange rate.
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