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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: I would like to invest in four Canadian companies for my 90 year old mother. The investments need to be quite safe and pay a dividend, monthly or quarterly for month to month living expenses. I would prefer 4 different industries to avoid turndowns in any given sector. What would you suggest?

Read Answer Asked by Jack on July 02, 2014
Q: I wish to move a major portion of my US$ and $CDN portfolio into safe, defensive, securities such as bonds, preferred shares.ETF's or solid common shares that give me a reasonable yield. Please give me a few names to consider for each currency.
Many thanks
L
Read Answer Asked by Lloyd on July 02, 2014
Q: INKM is the SPDR Income Allocation ETF for U.S. funds. It "seeks to provide total return by focusing on investment in income and yield-generating assets." It holds about 20 SPDR etf's with global representation, and offers a dividend yield of over 3%. It's only about a year old with total net assets of 100M. It looks good to me for my U.S. funds but I don't see it mentioned on 5i and wonder if you would make your initial comments on it. Thank you.
Read Answer Asked by Jerry on July 02, 2014
Q: Hi,

Can you please comment on the ETF HHF in Toronto. It seems to have some good holdings like TOU, VRX, GIB.A etc.
Read Answer Asked by Imtiaz on July 02, 2014
Q: Good morning - what are your thoughts on MMP.UN (Sentry Precious Metals and Mining Trust)? Might this be a good way for an income investor to participate in the gold and silver sectors and get a decent dividend and a bit of growth?
Read Answer Asked by Kirk on July 02, 2014
Q: What is your opinion about CAB-T (high qualit bond fund)? . Thanks ebrahim
Read Answer Asked by ebrahim on June 30, 2014
Q: I would like to park some cash in CBO.
Would not the CBO ETF value go down when interest rates increase as I believe they will in the first quarter of 2015?
Net return could be minimal or less going forward during this 6 month time frame.
Read Answer Asked by Don on June 30, 2014
Q: Hello,

This is kind of a follow up of a previous question. In my RRSP I have the following ETFs: ZRE, XRB, VBK, VCN, VDY, VXUS and XSB.
I would like to replace XSB (around 30K) with something that provides more growth. I was thinking an energy basket, either an ETF or 2-4 energy (related) stocks.

Do you have any suggestions?

Thank you
Marios
Read Answer Asked by Marios on June 28, 2014
Q: XHY (US High Yield Bond ETF-CAD Hedged)had a 52-Week Range of
20.58 low to 22.19 high - gain of 7.82% in ETF price + dividend of 5.28%.
Would you mind explaining how or why it gained in ETF price if interest rates remained the same (assuming they did). Is this a safe place to put large sums of cash and if not where do u put cash?
Thank you.

Read Answer Asked by George on June 26, 2014
Q: With respect to the Floating Rate Bond ETF (HFR) that has been recommended, according to the linked statement, the total expenses associated with the operation of the fund were 1.41% in the latest period, a figure that seems awfully high for a product with an advertised yield of just over 2% - with ETF'S, it's not sufficient to simply look at the MER since total costs can be substantially above the advertised MER

If one is concerned about the impact of rising rates on a interest product, would a ladder of gic's not be more appropriate, especially given they have no management expenses to water down the return

http://www.horizonsetfs.com/Pdf/FundSummary/HFR_FundSummary.pdf
Read Answer Asked by Bruce on June 26, 2014
Q: Hi peter and team, could you please recommend a good international short duration corporate bond etf with a decent yield and fair management fees,and thanks for this great service you provide
Read Answer Asked by James on June 25, 2014
Q: If putting money into a Bond ETF which two would you recommend with good liquidity for the following?
1)Rising interest rates?
2)Falling interest rates?
3)No change in interest rates?
Is one better off buying their own laddered bonds and holding to maturity than using ETFs?
Thanks
Read Answer Asked by George on June 25, 2014
Q: I am considering an ETF outside North America. What do you think of XIN and XEF? Do you think the Cdn $ hedged is preferable? Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by christianne on June 25, 2014
Q: Hello 5i Team,

Please give me your thoughts on the better ETF buy for a 2-5 year hold...or possibly more: XIU or XCS?
Thank you so much.
Read Answer Asked by Paul on June 25, 2014
Q: Hi Peter and team:
I have a fair amount of my equities in Cnd banks, pipelines and utilities, the purpose is to generate a steady source of dividends which I am lucky as the above has done well
I am in my early 60s, has a small position in VIG in US
I wonder if I want to diversify by adding new money to US and International ETF for the purpose of income esp re: dividends, if you could suggest something including your opinion in VIG,
I am aware that some of the dividends generated from outside Canada might NOT be treated as friendly from a taxation point of view if it is from dividends generated from Canadian companies, your help would be much appreciated, great Job team!
Read Answer Asked by Michael on June 24, 2014
Q: Greatly appreciate your excellent service. I would like to include an investment in water resources in the Materials portions of my portfolio. Could you suggest some options, preferably in Canada. Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by Bill on June 23, 2014
Q: ETF portfolio question: I'm looking at the iShares 2014 Annual Report for global ETF and see some very impressive returns for 1 year (as of Mar. 31,2014.) Further, I checked the iShares web site to see the performance for each calendar year since 2008.


So here is my question: Would it make sense to invest, say, 50% of one's portfolio in international ETFs such as the following 4: IXJ (Healthcare...a top performer, RXI (Cons. Discretionary...another top performer), and then XI (Industrials), IXN (Tech.). The weightings are to be determined but I'm considering: 20, 20, 5, 5 percent. What are the risks? Can the whole world crash? And, if this is such a smart idea, how come I haven't seen anyone else propose this?


The balance would be invested in Can. and US stocks and/or etf's. If I could grow my portfolio by 25% per year for the next 5 years, I would be vey happy. (I realize, no one knows when there may be another 2008/2009 type of melt-down). Thank you.
Read Answer Asked by Helen on June 22, 2014
Q: Hi guy,s..Glad to support your ride, Peter..Good luck!Best etf,s include BCE in them. Thanks,Cliff
Read Answer Asked by cliff on June 20, 2014
Q: Peter,
What is year end date for Mutual Funds, and for Etf's (if any specific date for those)
Thank you
CDJ
Read Answer Asked by claude on June 20, 2014
Q: Hi Peter
I have 24% US in RRSP and looking to rebalance for income with some growth. Currently hold AAPL 5.8%, Gild 5.1% PG 7.3%, C 1.2%, CX 2.8% and US money market. Thanks Hamish
Read Answer Asked by Hamish on June 20, 2014