- Royal Bank is the longest-standing Canadian Olympic partner since 1947
- Breaking makes its debut at Paris 2024 with RBC Training Ground athlete Phil Wizard
- Events will be spread out over Paris and 16 other cities in France
- Canadian Tire supports amateur sport from the playground to the podium through its Jumpstart charity
The 2024 Summer Olympics, officially branded as Paris 2024, start Friday and will be host to more than 329 events in 32 sports. Some TSX companies will also be going for sponsorship gold by partnering with the Canadian athletes and the Canadian Olympic Committee.
The events will be spread out over Paris and 16 other cities in France, including Versailles, Bordeaux, Lyon and Nice. Events inside Paris include beach volleyball at Eiffel Tower Stadium, a temporary venue built on the famous Champ de Mars, fencing at the Grand Palais and football (soccer) at Parc des Princes. Athletics will be at Stade de France in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis.
The basketball preliminaries and handball finals will be in Lille with some football matches spread around the country in locales ranging from Bordeaux to the Mediterranean city of Marseille. Surfing events will take place in the overseas territory of French Polynesia.
Canada’s athlete with the most Olympic appearances, table tennis player Mo Zhang, will make her fifth consecutive Olympic appearance at Paris 2024 at the Paris Expo Porte de Versailles.
La Concorde will be the site of the debut of breaking (better known as breakdancing) as an Olympic sport.
Let’s take a look at three Canadian companies on the TSX that are supporting athletes and stand to benefit from their partnerships with Team Canada and Canadian Olympians.
Royal Bank of Canada
YTD: up 14.2%
All time: up 2,027.9%
Last trading: C$152.97
Canadian athlete Philip Kim, aka “B-Boy Phil Wizard,” is the 2023 world silver medallist and a Pan Am Games champion in breaking. Kim is an RBC Olympian and will compete in Paris giving Canada a shot at the podium.
Royal Bank (TSX:RY) is the longest-standing corporate partner with the Canadian Olympic Committee and has been supporting Canada’s Olympic team since 1947. RBC has also provided support for amateur and elite athletes in the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. RBC has initiatives such as RBC Training Ground to recruit prospective athletes and the Olympians program that funds select athletes and provides career experience.
Team Canada will send 337 athletes to the Olympic Games, including 174 first-time Olympic team members. Of the 141 returning Olympic team members, 38 have an Olympic medal. Swimmer Penny Oleksiak owns seven medals and is Canada’s all-time most decorated Olympian. Sprinter Andre De Grasse has six.
BCE
Market cap: $41.6 billion
YTD: down, 15.1%
All time gain: 901.3%
Last trading: C$45.66
While Canadian Olympians are in Paris and training internationally, they have access via BCE Inc.’s (TSX:BCE) Bell Canada’s Bell Athletes Connect Program which connects athletes to their families and friends while representing Canada internationally. Bell also sponsors a free all-access community to support Canadians at the Paris Olympics.
Bell Media’s TSN and RDS networks will also be airing many Olympic events as a partner of the Olympic broadcast consortium along with CBC and Sportsnet.
Canadian Tire
Market cap: $8 billion
YTD: down, 1.69%
All time gain: up, 1,029.3%
Last trading: C$139.21
Founded more than 100 years ago in 1922, Canadian Tire (TSX:CTC.A) supports amateur sport from the playground to the podium through its Canadian Tire Jumpstart charity that helps kids participate in organized sport and recreation. The company has three areas of income – retail, financial services and CT REIT (real estate investment trust).
After 1900 and 1924, this is the third time Paris will be host of the Olympics. Paris is also the second city to be host the Summer Olympics three times after London which had the Games in 1848, 1908 and 2012. This will be the sixth Olympics in France. In addition to the three summer games, the country has been host to three winter games, Chamonix 1924, Grenoble 1968 and Albertville 1992.
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