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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 am a long term Buy and hold investor with more focus on dividend paying stocks. I have roughly 19% of my total portfolio in Financial sector. 16% of that is from financial stocks and 3% from ETFs (market ETFs financial portion). 8.2% in five (TD, RY, CM, BNS, BMO) banks, 2.5% in two Insurance(SLF and MFC), and 4.2% in financials preferred (IGM.PR.B, GWO.PR.M, PWF.PRF, BIP.PR.E). I think am Ok with my Insurance and preferred weighing. Two questions:
• Considering the current conditions, is 8.2% in five banks OK or should I trim some and invest in some other sectors?
• TD and RY have higher weighing with TD at 3.3% and RY at 1.9%, the rest three roughly 1% each, Should I sell some of TD and RY and buy other banks or something else?

In case you need my overall asset allocation:
Equity: 63%, Fixed income (including cash): 22%, Real estate: 6.5%, Preferred: 8.5%
CDN: 73% (Equity: 48%, Fixed Income: 21% and Real estate: 4%), US: 18% and Global: 9%
Four highest weighing (59%) sectors are: Multi sectors (Market ETFS): 25%, Financials: 16%, Utilities: 11%, telecom: 7%, the rest in various other sectors.
Read Answer Asked by Naren on September 04, 2019
Q: Would you please give me your current opinion of this stock. The price seems to have stayed in a trading range of $ 8.30 - 8.90 this year, much lower than previous years. However, it still continues to pay the high dividend & has done now for some 15 years or so.

Even with the decline in price it still has a good overall yield.

EIT is another high yield stock. What do you think of it.

Thanks
Read Answer Asked by Ross on September 02, 2019
Q: The only one I've owned and still do in this group is SLF - been a great investment over last 10 years +. I was thinking of buying MFC for my wife's portfolio since she does not have an insurance company. MFC's balance sheet looks great: very little debt., low pay-out ratio (lots of room to increase dividends). The stock seems to languish - low interest rate environment, I guess? Do you like this one for the long haul??
Read Answer Asked by James on August 26, 2019
Q: Good morning...I have searched the internet and found the payout ratio of fsz at 60.62% is that correct. I have a 3% weighting in this stock and love the dividend as I am a senior that uses that dividend for expenses. Do you view a 3% weighting in this company proper considering its valuation and payout ratio...thank you..gene
Read Answer Asked by gene on August 22, 2019
Q: Hello Gentlemen,
I was looking to invest into Canadian Banks; Would appreciate your opinion on which two or three banks would be your top picks over the next 6 months to a year. I am looking for something more secure and pays a dividend.
Thanks Hugh
Read Answer Asked by Hugh on August 22, 2019
Q: I am currently overweight the financial sector. I am concerned about the trend to negative interest and the risk of a recession. The odds of market declines are increasing in my opinion.
Protection of capital is more important than income.
We are not supposed to time the market.
Should I put this group in cash ?
The group will be hurt by negative interest rates or am I wrong on this.
Read Answer Asked by Doug on August 19, 2019
Q: 5 eyes - why is the bid 10% less than the ask on this US insurer? If I want to sell shares (I don't actually) then do I take a 10% haircut? David Fingold's fav insurer - which would you buy between PGR and Chubb and secondly would you recommend a buy at this time of a US insurer generally? Delighted as always - Ken
Read Answer Asked by Ken on August 16, 2019
Q: Can you explain how an investor can get a negative yield on a bond? For instance German 10 year bonds have a negative yield. Does that mean that there is a premium paid on the price say 102.00 and investor receives 100.00 at maturity. Does the investor receive semi-annual coupons like other bonds? Are the coupons more than 0.00 or are they negative also? Thank you.
Read Answer Asked by Robert on August 15, 2019
Q: Hi,

I am looking to reduce my exposure to financials across my family's portfolio, from 23% to 13%. Sunlife (3.03%), Royal Bank (3.41%) and TD Bank (5.55%) comprise our most significant holdings, all of which we have held for many years. I am looking to reduce and reallocate one of those positions as part of the overall reduction. Which in your judgement would be the best candidate to let go?

Finally, and I apologize if this question has been asked and answered before: is there any drill-down facility planned in the 5i Portfolio Analysis features that would list all holdings in a particular asset class, geographic sector, and/or industry? Or does the facility exist and I am missing it? For example, it would be helpful to have the portfolio analytics tool to be able to list the holdings that it is including in its calculation of the portfolio “financials” weighting.

Thanks
Derek
Read Answer Asked by Derek on August 15, 2019