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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: Last week I was talking to my 80-something neighbour “Jim” (Canadian resident) who recently returned home from his (owned) condo in Arizona.

Over tea this morning Jim’s spouse Susan broadly shared with us her concern of how messy and drawn-out it might be for her personally to dispose of the U.S. property in the event Jim dies before her. Their adult kids want nothing to do with the condo, don’t want to travel to the U.S., and wonder why their parents continue to own instead of lease.

Jim handles the finances and is a strong and silent type. He jokes with me he is immortal because he has no concrete plans of dying. (wtf?..). In his mind, Susan is concerned over nothing because his will transfers everything to her upon his death. Jim changes the subject when Susan asks about the future of the condo. She doesn’t want the stress of settling the disposition in his absence.

Questions:
In your experience,
1)how common is this situation?
2)is there anything Jim (and people in his situation) commonly overlook in this simple plan?
Read Answer Asked by Trevor on April 06, 2026
Q: RE: TD Direct Investing - Stock Lending Program

This idea is new to me, and I’m interested in better understanding the concept.

According to the website, the benefit of participating is the interest the person lending their stock receives, which is split 50/50 with TD. There is no indication of what percentage interest you’ll receive. While I understand interest would fluctuate, without a range, it’s hard to determine the actual benefit or whether participation is worthwhile.

For an individual investor.
1) What are the major pros and cons of participating in a program like this?
2) Are there big differences if using a tax-deferred account vs a taxable account?
Read Answer Asked by Raymond on April 06, 2026
Q: Retired, dividend-income investor. I've been pondering this question for months.

I run a concentrated portfolio, normally holding approximately 10 ETFs and 10-12 stocks.....plus fixed income. Over the years with 5iR, I have tried to follow your rough guidelines...as follows:

1. Target < 15% Covered Call ETFs => I'm just over 15%....ok as is.
2. Target < 15% per Fund company => I'm just over 16% with BMO ETFs (ZLB, ZUT, ZRE, ZWC), 15% with iShares (CDZ, XIT, XST), and < 5% with other funds (NNRG, HHL, HMAX, etc.).

If the target % is based on my entire portfolio, I am ok. However, if it is based on "equity-only", my #'s jump to 22%, 17% and 8% respectively.

Q#1 = please clarify Equity only vs entire portfolio. How much leeway is there if it is only on Equities?

3. CIPF insurance target < $1mm per account (TFSA/Cash total versus RRSP/RRIF total), allowing for the 50-50 spousal split on joint accounts. I'm ok currently, but starting to crowd the limit on one of these.

4. Then we throw in some of the recent questions about a very simplified portfolio based on only a handful of ETFs, so you would obviously be over the limits above.

Q#2 = how do we meet all of these potentially opposing targets?

Thanks....Steve
Read Answer Asked by Stephen on March 31, 2026
Q: Hi,
I think Turkey is one of the global leader in drone manufacturing, and was said ‘politically neutral’. Too tough of a question maybe, but where does it stand in the Iran war? How does its production compare to US, China, and even Ukraine?

You mentioned KTOS, AVAV, ONDS. Is US self-sufficient forever ?
Thanks,

Read Answer Asked by Denise on March 31, 2026
Q: Hi. I asked this question yesterday but I don't think it went through.

I saw an interview with Prof. Janice Stein and Rudyard Kipling from the Munk School. Ms. Stein seems convinced that there is going to be significant supply shocks and oil at $175/barrel as a result of the war with Iran. If this is true, what stocks/sectors from your model portfolios are the best to hold and the best to stay on the sidelines until this mess is resolved?
Read Answer Asked by Ian on March 30, 2026
Q: How can I buy ARKVX in Canada? It has the largest holding of SpaceX stock, which is about to go public.

Also, if I Sell $10,000 in my TFSA and Buy $10,000 in another Stock in my TFSA, will this impact my TFSA Limit? Keep in mind my Margin leverages my TFSA.

Thanks as always for your amazing Service!
Read Answer Asked by Austin on March 25, 2026
Q: Could you recommend some Canadian financial planning books for Seniors? Particularly, for estate planning and tax savings.
Thankyou
Read Answer Asked by Steve on March 24, 2026
Q: I have recently initiated a 3% in Cameco based on matching the growth portfolio and recent recommendations on questions. However less than a week later a question stated that there is negative momentum with critical minerals and investors should wait for a bit. This seems like a large shift in sentiment in a short period of time, has an event or news changed your opinion on Cameco? Valuation? I’m now unsure what to do with my position as I don’t want to hold a stock with negative momentum when there could be better options at this time. Would you sell and replace with something more positive? If so do you have 3 recommendations? (Sector does not matter)
Thank you for your great service!
Read Answer Asked by Nick on March 24, 2026
Q: Everyone, if I was trying to convince my two 30 something year old daughters to subscribe to this service what would i say? Clayton
Read Answer Asked by Clayton on March 23, 2026
Q: Everyone, how often should you be rebalancing your portfolio? Clayton
Read Answer Asked by Clayton on March 20, 2026
Q: What are the lessons learned on these to avoid in future on the above stocks. All of these were unfortunately full positions over many years.
Read Answer Asked by Shyam on March 16, 2026
Q: I seem to recall a question quite a while ago (years?) about the maximum % of your portfolio should be by fund company. If I remember correctly, your suggestion was to cap each fund company exposure to 15%. Am I correct and do you still feel the same?

My BMO ETFs are just over 16%.
My iShares ETFs are just over 15%.
I have smaller exposures to the fund companies holding HMAX, HHL, NNRG (around 5% each).

Please remind me again what the dangers are of exceeding your suggested threshold? For the larger fund companies, is the threshold higher?

Thanks for your help....much appreciated....Steve
Read Answer Asked by Stephen on March 13, 2026
Q: As a long term investor of Goeasy I am not very impressed with the trouble that Goeasy has got themselves in, but am glad to see they appear to be setting the record straight now.
I guess I'm fortunate to still be up about 300% but having been up 1200% at times it still hurts. (fortunately I did take money of the table at times).
My question is what due diligents does 5I do when "Reporting" on a company beyond what the Company reports?
Thank You
john
Read Answer Asked by John on March 12, 2026
Q: Thank you for your answer - sounds like VWAP is an institutional tool rather than some sort of performance measurement tool, as are most of the other measurement criteria.
Read Answer Asked by Mike on March 12, 2026
Q: what is vwap and how is it a measure of performance or other criteria?

Read Answer Asked by Mike on March 12, 2026