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Investment Q&A

Not investment advice or solicitation to buy/sell securities. Do your own due diligence and/or consult an advisor.

Q: Recently read John Bogle, "Common Sense Investing"

What are my choices for purchasing the s & p 500 index, please compare MER, do all offer a canadian hedge? and what are the pros and cons of buying it hedged to canadian dollar?

thanks

Ernie
Read Answer Asked by Ernest on January 03, 2019
Q: Two questions on Canadian equity/dividend ETFs:

1) The holdings in DGRC are selected based on market cap, expected earnings growth, return on equity, and return on assets. How is it that none of the Big 5 Canadian banks qualify for inclusion in their portfolio? This is puzzling to me. What is your opinion of this ETF for the core Canadian equity component of one's portfolio, for a longterm hold?

2) You continue to recommend XIC despite reminding members, many a time, of how the TSX index is heavily concentrated in financials and energy. Why? It is a cheap ETF, but other CDN equity ETFs (like DGRC) are modestly more expensive but I can't help but think that the few extra basis points in cost are worth it if it allows for a more balanced sector allocation overall. You continue to recommend CDZ even though it is very expensive, with a MER of 0.66. Why? I know it is analogous to VGG/VIG, which you (and I) love, but I don't think they're comparable, since VGG/VIG contains many companies with a much longer history of dividend increases (including many so-called 'Dividend Aristocrats' and 'Dividend Kings' whereas inclusion in CDZ only requires that a company has a history of increasing its dividend in at least four of the last five years. It almost seems like the continued recommendation of XIC and CDZ is due more to historical reasons rather than their merits as of right now, relative to other ETFs that may not have been available when XIC and CDZ were first made available.


Read Answer Asked by Walter on January 03, 2019
Q: Hello and happy new year 2019

My question today is regarding xhy which is composed of high yielding US corporate debt but trades in Toronto in Canadian dollars. It mentions CAD hedged. Performance of Xhy is rather dreadful since Oct 2018, is this independent of the two curriencies ? I would have thought that a depreciating CAD would help boost the NAV. Or would an appreciating CAD boost NAV. Your thoughts ? Also, could you recommend a mutual fund equivalent of Xhy (albeit with higher fees).

Thanks so much

Daniel
Read Answer Asked by Daniel on January 02, 2019
Q: Hello and Happy New Year to all.
David Rosenberg during his semi annual visit to A. Maccreath's show on BNN talked about investing in non correlated assets. He highlighted Corporate bonds as being exciting and also long-short strategies. long Corporates and short Government bonds. This is exciting, but way above my pay-grade...any suggestions for non correlated assets to be checking out ?Thanks and sorry for the vague question
Read Answer Asked by Deborah on January 02, 2019
Q: Happy Holidays,
can I get your thought on the following:
1. why is ZID-T recent performance decent and FIH.U poor?
2. why is ZID-T recent performance decent and SP500 index poor?
I'm curious why ZID performance is relatively good as of late.

thanks
Read Answer Asked by Ian on December 31, 2018
Q: Hi All:

Hope you all have been enjoying the X'mas season. Happy 2019 to each one of you!

I noticed the cost per unit on the monthly statement changes sometimes for the ETFs I own. I own another one other than ZBK. I wonder what makes it change? When I sell them should I use the cost per unit on the monthly statement as ACB? If I sell part of it that I should use that month cost per unit to calculate the ACB?

Thank you.

Louisa
Read Answer Asked by LOUISA on December 28, 2018
Q: I hold both ZWH and TXF - both "covered calls". I would like to switch out of "covered call". Do you know the equivalent ETF for these two that have no "covered call"?

Carl
Read Answer Asked by Carl on December 27, 2018
Q: I was reading an article in today's Globe and Mail where they were commenting on Investors fleeing the US trillion dollar debt market (leveraged loans)- and they felt they were becoming riskier in the current environment where interest rates were not expected to go up as much as predicted - MFT holds leveraged loans I believe - how safe do you view this ETF in this environment? - I looked at the price and it has a good current yield of 5.057% and although down a bit from its year high of $21.64 (currently trading at $20.72)- it has hung in there pretty well. I know it is hard in this environment to try and figure out which space to be in with the current unpredictable and uninformed US President - but I am just interested in your feeling about the floating rate space right now - hold, or sell. Right now I am interested in preserving principal and willing to take some risk. Was thinking of selling and maybe looking at it again once everything settles down to a more normal investing environment where rates might start going up again. Appreciate your insight - Karen
Read Answer Asked by Karen on December 27, 2018
Q: Hi,
I'm looking at some of the ETFs that short either an index, such as the S&P 500, or a sector like US Tech, or Industrial, etc. I am considering these as a way to hedge against longer term holdings in the same sectors and my thinking is that as a managed ETF, as long as it has liquidity, I should be able to exit it when things eventually turn around as you would with any other ETF. What are the pitfalls of doing this? If it has any merit, which ETFs might you recommend?
Thanks and have a wonderful time with family over the holidays!
Dawn
Read Answer Asked by Dawn on December 27, 2018
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