A portfolio of stocks I've been building since September 3 is named Volio. It will eventually hold 52 dividend dogs. Volio is the fifth portfolio I've built (at a one dividend dog per-week pace) since 2014. Five portfolios = V for Volio!

Today I'm reviewing the fourth of five communication services sector stocks striving to constitute my Volio folio. This could be the fourteenth pick for Volio!

Now the communications services sector includes seven industries all related to delivering messages to and from us. Communication services industries are: advertising agencies; broadcasting; electronic gaming and multimedia; entertainment; internet content and information; publishing; telecom services.

My subject today is a large-cap telecom services company named, BCE Inc. Their trading ticker symbol is BCE. This is my first-ever report on BCE.

BCE, through its Bell brand, is both a wireless and Internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada.

It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its nearly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrier--the legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provinces--Ontario and Quebec.

Additionally, BCE has a media segment, which holds a television, radio, and digital media assets. BCE licenses the Canadian rights to movie channels including HBO, Showtime, and Starz. In 2018, the wireline segment comprised 54% of total revenue, while wireless comprised 36%. Media provided the remainder.

The company was formerly known as Bell Canada Enterprises Inc. BCE Inc. was founded in 1880 and is headquartered in Verdun, Canada.

I use three key data points to gauge dividend-paying equities or funds like BCE Inc:

(1) Price

(2) Dividends

(3) Returns

Besides those three, several other keys will finally unlock an equity or fund in which to invest, or not.

Those three basic keys, however, best tell whether a company has made, is making, and will make money.

BCE Price

BCE's price per share closed at $48.44 yesterday. A year ago its price was $43.18. So, in the past year, its price rose $5.26, or about 12%.

Assuming BCE's stock trades in a range of $42 to $50 this next year, it's recent $48.44 price could rise by $2.56  to reach $51.00 by early-December, 2020, assuming upward price momentum continues.

BCE Dividends

BCE's latest declared quarterly dividend was $0.60 payable January 15th.

That $0.60 Q dividend equates to $2.40 annually and yields 4.96% based on yesterday's $48.44 closing price.

BCE Gains?

Adding the $2.40 annual estimated dividend to my $2.56 estimate of BCE's price upside shows a $4.96 potential gross gain, per share, which will be reduced by any costs to trade these shares.

Say, for costs, a little over $1,000.00 today into BCE Inc. at its recent $48.44 price, we'd buy 21 shares of BCE.

A $10 broker fee paid half at purchase and half at sale could cost us about $0.48 per share.

Subtract that $0.48 brokerage cost from the estimated $4.96 gross estimated gain per share leaves a net gain of $4.48 X 21 shares = $94.08 or a 9.4% net gain on a $1,017.24 investment.

Therefore, BCE Inc, whose trading ticker symbol is BCE shows a possible 9.4% net gain including a 4.96% dividend yield. It could be more, it could be less.

The above speculation is based on past year performance. The actual results remain to be seen to learn if BCE Inc is worth your time and money.