February 2026 and Two Portfolio Additions

 

Bitter cold temperatures at times and consecutive weekend snow storms ending January have me looking forward to spring. February is usually the worst of the winters in these parts on the Atlantic coastline.

Meanwhile, I'm looking ahead to buying and adding another two stocks to my portfolio in February and looking ahead to March.

Looking at the Graham Numbers for Enbridge, ENB.TO and Fortis, FTS.TO with ex-dividend dates on February 17th, be aware both stocks are overvalued but producing capital gains and dividends. ENB.TO has a 3% increase for it's next dividend payout with a yield over 5% and FTS increased their dividend in November, 2024 by 4% with a yield of 3.5% and a 51 year streak.

I looked over last weeks earning reports for both Brookfield Infrastructure LP, BIP.UN and Brookfield Renewable Energy Partners LP, BEP.UN. Both had good reports with Brookfiled Renewable BEP.UN reporting record revenue. 

Both companies have their tentacles in new contracts, partnerships and buyouts with the more notable in the news wires these days ... the AI build outs, Nuclear Power and have assets internationally.

I currently own BIP.UN and will add BEP.UN before the 27th of February ex-dividend date. BEP.UN increased it's distribution paid in US dollars by 5% with a yield of 5.5%.

Brookfield Infrastructure, BIP.UN increased the distribution by 6% with a yield of 5%.

Brookfield looks complicated and confusing with all it's spin offs but keen managements know how to make money while I currently concentrate on their infrastructure and renewable branches. 

In the second half of February, my Financial Insurance companies have ex-dividend dates and they all performed well in 2025. I'm looking forward to the same in 2026 however no one knows with the Markets, just a lot of predictions by analysts and the growing reliance on AI researching past history. 

In March, I plan to add another Financial Insurance related company called Sagicor Financial Company, SFC.TO being undervalued and looking for gains with the current 3.9% yield, with a 12.5% increase to their dividend. SFC.TO will be research for the second half of March.

There's been a lot of stock market turmoil since the start of the year with daily US political news weighing and other factors. There will probably be another 3 years of this noise and depends who the next President of the US will be. I'm accustomed to the lows and highs that follow by now and continue with my long term investing plan.

The Modified BTSX Strategy for 2026

 

Years ago, I had a mixed bag of low yield ETFs and stocks with low gain potential where my goal was accumulating dividend income, continuing into retirement. 

Doing a Google search for stocks ranking from highest yield down in the TSX, I looked down through 60 of them and wanted to narrow down that list to what companies and banks could produce a decent total gain for the long term with compounding in mind.

Eventually I came across the Beat The TSX strategy that has beaten the TSX index annual return on average over the years. I didn't expect the list of 10 stocks with a different mix every year to beat the TSX yearly return on a given year where the stock market has it's ups and downs which affects some sectors/businesses more than others.

A good summary of the BTSX and updated for 2026 is on a recent Million Dollar Journey post.  

Companies and banks I researched in the list as they changed over the years, expanded to more than 20 stocks in the TSX 60 ranked by dividend yield I currently own. 

In the current list for 2026, I sold both BCE before the dividend cut last year and Telus where they have now stopped their dividend growth plans and perhaps a cut coming but no mention of that to date.

The steady news of over the top expenses and unsustainable dividends with these two Telcos brought on the decision to sell both. BCE looks like it's dividend policy is more in line now going ahead. It may pull off an Algonquin Power, AQN revival.

I never owned Algonquin Power where I thought the initial yield, when I looked it over years back was too high and that was cut. But, AQN has improved and made gains going into this year.

From the 2025 list ... Power Corporation: POW, TD Bank:TD and Emera: EMA performed better than I expected.  Overall, the TSX yearly gain of 29%+ was a surprise for 2025 with the BTSX closing the year with a 28% gain, even with the Telco laggards in that list.

The 2026 BTSX list.

1. Telus (T) 
2. Enbridge (ENB) 
3. Pembina Pipeline (PPL) 
4. BCE (BCE) 
5. Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ) 
6. TC Energy Corp (TRP) 
7. Emera (EMA) 
8. Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS) 
9. Sun Life (SLF) 
10. Canadian Tire (CTC.A) 

I rehashed my portfolio when I initially read about the BTSX strategy and concentrated more on specific sectors like the Big Banks, the pipelines, energy/power, oil/natural gas and financial/insurance companies to build on into the future and pleased with the results as I continue to accumulate with the Plan.

Taking the Pipeline sector for example, I initially bought Enbridge: ENB and then added Pembina Pipeline: PPL when it was a monthly dividend payer and now quarterly while PPL got into the BC coast natural gas plants for exporting. Expansion plans continue there.

Like Hannibal on The A-Team ... I love it when a plan comes together.