If you have spent some time on our site you may have noticed that we run a free youth weightlifting and boxing club in our community. Young Guns Weightlifting Club is a free co-ed fitness program for youth. It was started by our dad and us in September 2019.
Young Guns had been nominated for the 2020 Mission Regional Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards, Non-Profit of the Year. We also won the 2021 Fraser Valley Cultural Diversity Awards for Innovative Initiative (Small Organization) for our program.
We saw the need to get youth in our community moving for the many physical and mental health benefits of exercise. We realized that some of the greatest limitations that youth face when it comes to weightlifting was safety, inexperience, and lack of financial resources.
We created the club to provide free weightlifting training so that kids could learn how to lift weights safely and get results. With weightlifting, youth should work with a certified trainer or they could get hurt.
It could take many months to learn proper technique for compound exercises such as front squats and deadlifts. Many beginners aren't sure which exercises to begin with. We also found working out with a group was more motivating than lifting weights alone. We started reserving an entire gym so that the kids could feel safe and not have to wait around for the equipment while doing their circuit training. Have you tried to bench press or squat during peak times at a regular gym? There is always a line up.
Young Guns WC trains four times a week and has certified trainers who coach up to 12 youth per session. We are currently teaching the basics of weightlifting and boxing . Young Guns is always fundraising to offset gym and trainer costs through club merchandise sales. We have sold over $12,000 worth of club merchandise since we started the club. To find out more info on our club please follow us on Instagram (@youngguns_wc).
We are currently selling high-protein donuts. They are made at a local bakery. Each donut has about 5g of whey and casein protein. Almost as much as an egg. A limited number of donuts are made and sold on Fridays. A six pack of donuts sells for $20.
We currently have close to $7,000 to invest. We don’t need the money for at least a year as donut sales should cover our club costs. It’s time to take a calculated risk and invest the money. Either we make money or we learn some valuable lessons. We decided to invest in Suncor Energy (SU:TSX). How is investing in Petro-Canada gas stations going to help a free youth weightlifting club?
Oil prices generally rise during boom periods - as more oil is needed to manufacture and transport products - and fall during economic slowdowns. People are now starting to get back to normal. Driving and travelling more which is increasing gas prices at the pump. Oil is also a key component in the production of textiles, fertilizers, plastics, cosmetics and even steel.
We looked at many companies and decided to invest in Suncor Energy because it is Canada’s largest integrated energy company, with four large refineries and roughly 1,500 Petro-Canada retail locations. It is worth more than $36 billion today. This is not a penny stock. Owning refineries and pipelines is a major advantage for Suncor, when oil prices fall, for example, refinery margins often rise. We saw a few Suncor refineries in Edmonton and they looked like mini cities. 98% of oil companies do not have their own refineries and gas stations so their profits disappear when the price of oil drops.
Today Suncor stock is trading at around $24 a share. The share price was at $45 before Covid-19 hit in January 2020. You have to buy them when nobody wants them and the price of oil is rising. Suncor’s breakeven price is around $35 for each barrel (WTI crude). With WTI trading around $69 per barrel, Suncor’s making a lot of money. They generated a net profit of $868 million in the last quarter. That’s about $290 million in profit a month.
Nobody wants to buy oil stocks today but Suncor has been using it’s profits to pay down debt and buy back shares. They feel their share price is too cheap to ignore. This is a smart financial move.The dividend is currently at 3.5%. We expect the dividend to rise over the next few years. If we are correct the share price should follow. The math makes sense on this one.
