The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition that stocks considered oligopolies -- in which a few players dominate one sector -- have generated returns that have easily beaten the S&P/TSX Composite Index over the past 30 years, and they have done it with lower volatility. The Globe's David Berman writes that among the best oligopolies is Royal Bank of Canada. The payoff for its position atop the banking oligopoly is the $14.9-billion profit it generated in 2023. The 10-year return, annualized, is 10.8 per cent. There are many ways to pick a good bank stock, but simply sticking with Canada's largest bank seems to be paying off nicely. RBC's total return over the past decade is 178 per cent, with dividends, which is 21 percentage points more than the Big Six average. RBC has the largest market capitalization among the banks, and all Canadian companies, for that matter. It also has a deep reach within specific banking endeavours such as capital markets, commercial banking and wealth management. "It gets the greatest benefits of the oligopoly, just by sheer size," said John Aiken, analyst at Jefferies. "Some of the fixed costs, in terms of compliance and investment in technology, get spread over a larger base."