RBC, VOLATUS AEROSPACE, AND SHOPIFY: CANADA'S UNDERRATED WORLD-CLASS COMPANIES

MORE THAN JUST HOCKEY AND OIL: THE MIRACLE OF TORONTO

It was not just any victory: With a stunning 6-0 win over Qatar, Canada's national soccer team burst into the spotlight at the ongoing World Cup on home soil. A hat trick by Jonathan David sent Vancouver into a frenzy and impressively demonstrated to the global audience that while the Canadians have always been a powerhouse in ice hockey, they are now making a significant impact in soccer as well. This momentum can be directly applied to the economy of this vast North American nation. But while the athletes are making headlines, the stock market in Toronto—at least in this country—is leading a shadowy existence. German retail investors seem to suffer from tunnel vision when it comes to the US as they search for investment ideas across the Atlantic. Canada is unfairly labeled as a boring resource-based economy consisting solely of oil multinationals, gold mines, and endless forests. Yet the Canadian benchmark index, the TSX, has been quietly delivering first-class returns for years and is home to companies that rank among the absolute world leaders in innovation, efficiency, and—above all—the future technology of artificial intelligence (AI).

RBC: THE DEFENSIVE SPECIALIST AND TOP GROWTH PLAYER

The Royal Bank of Canada, or RBC for short, offers the perfect combination of defensive stability and modern tech potential. While its in-house research institute, RBC Borealis, amazes the assembled AI elite at global technology conferences and develops systems that analyze complex financial reports with the precision of human lead analysts, the core business in the background continues to deliver record-breaking results. The bank has long been operating on equal footing with the giants of Wall Street. Its investment banking division, RBC Capital Markets, has firmly established itself among the industry's top 15 worldwide. A direct comparison illustrates just how significant the Canadians have become: With a market capitalization of CAD 391 billion (approximately EUR 245 billion), RBC is exactly where Deutsche Bank would like to be—the latter currently has a market capitalization of just around EUR 60 billion.

Its pioneering role in AI and the corresponding investments do not come at the expense of profitability, as the figures for the past quarter impressively underscore. Net income rose by 25% year-over-year to CAD 5.5 billion. This jump was driven by a strong trading business and robust fee income in wealth management. At the same time, the bank reduced its provisions for potential loan losses to CAD 912 million—a clear sign of the first-class quality of its loan portfolio in the strictly regulated Canadian market. The stock market is rewarding these operational successes with a stable upward trend that has persisted for three years. Last week, the stock once again reached a new all-time high of CAD 287.68; on German exchanges, it is currently trading at around EUR 175.00.

For investors, the stock is a true cash machine and also a certified "dividend aristocrat." According to the Canadian index definition, this coveted designation is awarded when a company has increased its dividends for five consecutive years. RBC meets this criterion with flying colours. Thanks to an outstanding return on equity of 17.2%, the quarterly dividend was most recently raised by 7% to CAD 1.76 per share. But that is not all: RBC is leveraging its financial strength to launch a massive share buyback program, in which up to 45 million of its own shares—about 3% of the total outstanding shares—are to be removed from the market. With a common equity tier 1 ratio of 13.5%, the balance sheet remains rock-solid even after this major move. Canada's industry leader proves that it is possible to shape the technological future of banking while generously rewarding shareholders.

VOLATUS AEROSPACE: THE WILD CARD THAT COMPLETELY TURNS THE GAME AROUND

Even off the beaten path, there are surprising traces of modern Canadian technology. Volatus Aerospace, for example, was long perceived on the stock market as a purely industrial company that monitors pipelines and industrial facilities with its own fleet of drones. But behind the scenes, a fundamental transformation is taking place. The company is rapidly evolving into a highly profitable, vertically integrated defence and technology platform with AI at its core. Instead of merely selling hardware as a one-time transaction, management is consistently focusing on recurring revenue through software licenses and subscription models (Software as a Service). Volatus achieved its technological breakthrough at CANSEC 2026, Canada's leading defence trade show, with the unveiling of V-Cortex. The system is a tiny AI box weighing barely 15 grams and measuring 3.5 x 3.5 cm, which functions as a vendor-neutral operating system for the autonomous aviation of the future. V-Cortex makes existing aircraft intelligent in the blink of an eye—and it is platform-independent. The AI enables navigation entirely without a GPS signal, making the systems immune to enemy jammers. This development is directly supported by the Canadian government through the National Research Council.

At the same time, with the SKYDRA platform—a subscription-based drone defence system launched in March—Volatus is tapping into a rapidly growing global market worth billions. Just how serious the Canadians are about global defence expansion is demonstrated by an alliance formed in May with the Canadian-Ukrainian defence center UCan Brave Tech. Volatus acts as the industrial gateway here, translating the valuable drone expertise tested on the front lines in Ukraine into industrial mass production that meets NATO standards. The technology is manufactured at the company's own state-of-the-art defence hub in Mirabel, Québec. In June, Volatus secured CAD 34.5 million in fresh capital through a capital increase to fund its global rollout. The appointment of Catherine Loubier to the board of directors further underscores that the political foundation for major contracts is in place. The experienced economic diplomat most recently represented the province of Québec as Commissioner General in New York and played a key role in initiating a multi-billion-dollar energy agreement for clean, hydroelectric power between Hydro-Québec and the State of New York.

The latest figures show that the growth engine is already running at full speed. Revenue stagnated at CAD 5.6 million in the first quarter as planned due to the business model transformation, but the gross margin rose from 32% to a healthy 35%—a record high in the company's history. From an investor's perspective, Volatus is a relative valuation bargain with a market capitalization of around CAD 420 million. While some of its US drone competitors on the Nasdaq are valued at sometimes outrageous multiples, the stock—with a price-to-sales (P/S) ratio of 8 for the current year—is one of the cheapest in the entire sector. The drone pioneer is regarded on the Toronto Stock Exchange as an exciting growth stock with significant upside potential, given its low share price of around CAD 0.57 (~EUR 0.35 on German exchanges).

SHOPIFY: THE OFFENSIVE STAR AND THE WHIMS OF THE STANDS

Shopify offers the perfect blueprint for a Canadian tech pioneer's journey from a small niche provider to the very top of the global market. What once began as software for an online snowboard shop is now a global giant with a market capitalization of nearly CAD 200 billion, leaving established US competitors in Silicon Valley in awe. More than 14% of the entire US e-commerce market now runs on the Canadian company's systems. The company has long since shed its image as merely a modular platform for small business owners: Global heavyweights and world-renowned brands such as L'Oréal, Starbucks, and General Motors process their digital sales—amounting to billions—through Shopify's ecosystem. The key to its continued success—and the next major catalyst for growth—is, just as with the Royal Bank of Canada and Volatus Aerospace, the consistent integration of artificial intelligence.

Shopify is not just playing around in a lab; it is delivering tangible revenue drivers to its affiliated merchants. At the heart of it all is the AI-driven Shopify Catalog, which now intelligently organizes well over a billion products. For merchants, this technology is worth its weight in gold: searches powered by the in-house catalog AI have been proven to convert into actual sales in online stores twice as often as with traditional solutions. At the same time, the on-demand AI assistant Sidekick is revolutionizing sellers' back offices. The number of active stores using Sidekick has quadrupled year-over-year. Nearly half of all newly created automated merchant workflows were already generated by AI in the first quarter. The quarterly figures underscore that this aggressive pace of innovation is driving extreme operational strength. Revenue rose by a spectacular 34% year-over-year to USD 3.17 billion, driven by a 35% increase in gross merchandise volume to over USD 100 billion. Adjusted gross profit climbed 32% to USD 1.54 billion.

But the stock market is unforgiving. Investors were put off by the conservative forecast for the coming quarter, which projects revenue growth in the "high 20% range" and slightly rising costs for the AI rollout. For a stock with a traditionally ambitious tech valuation, a "Very Good" is not enough; the share price plummeted to a 52-week low. For long-term investors, the current level of around CAD 152 (~EUR 93.28 in Germany) presents a buying opportunity. Management demonstrated its unwavering confidence in the company's earnings power with a bombshell announcement in early June: the Executive Board increased the current share buyback program by USD 3 billion to a total of USD 5 billion. Coupled with forward-looking new alliances—such as a global advertising integration with the social media platform Reddit—the company is reinforcing its role as an innovation leader. Shopify is the high-growth flagship of the Toronto stock market and demonstrates that Canada's tech companies have the clout to dominate global markets in the long term. RBC and Volatus Aerospace fit seamlessly into this lineup.