The Globe and Mail attempts to identify large and liquid Canadian stocks with strong profitability and momentum in its Thursday, Oct. 9, edition. The Globe's Craig McGee writes in the Number Cruncher column that he looked for stocks with the best combination of the following metrics: return on equity; revision of the consensus earnings-per-share estimate over the past three months; latest earnings surprise (the percentage difference between the firms' quarterly operating earnings and the consensus estimate for that quarter); price momentum over the past three and nine months, as well as 12 months (where stocks closer to their 12-month high are favoured). Also, the one-month price change could not be negative. Over the 12 months ended Sept. 30, the strategy generated a total return of 21.1 per cent versus 20.4 per cent for the S&P/TSX Total Return Index. Canadian large-cap stocks with strong profitability and momentum are Emera, George Weston, Fortis, Empire, Fairfax Financial Holdings, Corus Entertainment and Intact Financial.