Canadian banks a haven in tough times

While we all were hiding under our desks, something was going on at Canada’s largest chartered banks. They were deftly swinging into preservation mode. Think about the brutality of the past twelve months for both the economy and the financial services industry, and then pull up a share price chart for the Big 6 banks.

The stock prices of all but one of the six are up over the past twelve months. Plus the dividends have continued without a haircut, unlike at Bank of America (BAC:NYSE), Citibank (C:NYSE) and WellsFargo (WFC:NYSE) for example.

The TSX is down about 24% during the same timeframe, and the performance of the Dow Jones 30 is no different.

Amazing. Credit also goes to the unheralded regulators, but investors shouldn’t ignore what’s been accomplished by the collective management teams over the past year.

MRM