Canadian Pacific operates a transcontinental railway in Canada and in the Northeast and Midwest U.S. The combined company transports products ranging from bulk commodities to merchandise freight across a 20,000-mile rail network and has nearly 20,000 employees.

When the newsflow is running fast and furious, the relevance for typical metrics of market health can be buried. And that may be in play at the moment, with recent volatility evident in the VIX index, which last week hit a high above 23, quickly dropped down to 19, popped up again to 22, ended the week at 17, and now is at 16. Many headlines drove the action, but it was news that a deal is at hand to reopen the Strait of Hormuz that won the day -- with stocks zooming higher as a result. But before that (and turning back to those buried metrics), the insider-sentiment data from Vickers Stock Research showed that insiders were taking some cover in case it was bad news that won out at a time when stocks were at all-time highs (and thus vulnerable). Most notable was a pop in the NYSE One-Week Sell/Buy Ratio, which spiked to 10.02 on a scale where any reading above 6.00 is bearish. But that was then and this is now, so we'll see how insiders react this week to seemingly positive developments. Turning to Vickers' sector sentiment data, we note that four sectors sport a bullish one-week ratio (down from five last week), five are neutral, and two are bearish (Communication Services and Information Technology). Of the bearish two, the Information Technology ratio has continued to move deeper into bearish territory, with a one-week reading of 36.9 compared to 30.1 last week. While that remains below the extreme 173.0 that the sector saw in late April, the consistency of bearish one-week readings for the sector have resulted in an Information Technology Eight-Week Sell/Buy Ratio of 11.7. That makes IT the only sector to book a long-term bearish reading. Still, bright spots remain across the landscape, with bullish One-Week and Eight-Week Sell/Buy readings for the Energy, Financial, Healthcare, and Real Estate sectors. This week, analysts at Vickers highlighted insider transactions of interest at AST SpaceMobile Inc. (NGS: ASTS) and Republic Services Inc. (NYSE: RSG).

Statistics Canada announced in late May that gross domestic product (GDP) for the Canadian economy slipped by 0.1% in 1Q26, after a revised 1.0% decline in 4Q25. That meets the technical definition of a recession (two consecutive quarterly declines). It was the first such instance since the coronavirus pandemic in 2020. The 1Q drop was very much unexpected, with the consensus calling for a 1.5% growth rate. One major culprit for the shortfall was a strong 2.9% rise in imports. Meanwhile, household spending grew, but was offset by reduced business and government investments. Hoping the 1Q figure would be amended upward in a later revision, Canadian economists stopped short of calling the Canadian economy currently in a recession. With U.S. tariffs and the Iran conflict top of mind, the Bank of Canada left its benchmark interest rate at 2.25% when it met in April, marking four consecutive meetings at which the rate was held. The central bank's latest GDP forecast calls for the economy to grow by 1.2% in 2026, implying a healthy resurgence from the 1Q rate, and by 1.6% in 2027. With worries about inflation from elevated energy prices offset by the weak 4Q/1Q showing in economic growth, most economists expect the central bank to maintain its current interest-rate stance through its next several meetings. We continue to favor select companies in the Canadian market for country diversification and growth opportunities.

Canadian Pacific Kansas City is a Class I railroad operating on tracks that span most of Canada and into parts of the Midwestern and Northeastern United States. Following the April 2023 Kansas City Southern merger, CPKC operates new single-linehaul services from Canada and the Upper Midwest down through Texas, the Gulf of Mexico, and into Mexico. It also hauls cross-border and intra-Mexico freight via operating concessions on more than 3,000 miles of rail in Mexico. CPKC hauls shipments of grain, intermodal containers, energy products (like crude and frac sand), chemicals, plastics, coal, fertilizer and potash, automotive products, and a diverse mix of other merchandise.