Statistics Canada reports food and restaurant sales in Alberta down 0.2%. So just a tiny decline despite the economy. I continue to see Boston Pizza as strong investment with a good yield around 8% and the distribution unlikely to be cut or if cut due to lower sales I suspect it would be a tiny cut as they distribute close to all distributable cash flow. And, we might even see an increase before long.
The notion (reported by CIBC this week) that Canadians as a population have $75 billion in excess cash savings strikes me as wrong. It would be true for some individuals. But the story seemed to forget that the excess cash would be in the bank and loaned out by the bank. We all know that Canadians as a population have a lot of mortgage debt. And banks usually have deposits about equal to loans. So high mortgage levels require high deposits and deposits are cash savings to someone.