Investment Q&A

Q: What is your opinion of the usefulness of the Shiller CAPE ratio, and is there a site where the CAPE is available for individual companies ?

Thanks,
Mark

Q: Would you please tell me what you know about this company and how to invest in it. Do you think it has possibilities positive possibilities? Thank you. Anne

Q: Hi, I was wondering what the simplest way to calculate a companies debt (or what ratio you like using) and what you would consider too much debt, and OK debt for a company.

Q: Good Evening
Two of Canada’s largest private debt funds, Bridging Finance Inc. and Romspen Investment Corp., froze investor redemptions today, the latest sign of COVID-19-related stress in a sector popular with wealthy, income-seeking investors.

Do you see a similar action followed by mutual fund/ ETF companies freezing redemptions if things get worse with respect to COVID -19 ?

Thanks

Q: If I am enrolled in a drip, is the stock purchased at a discounted rate or the market price of a stock. I own the listed companies; are any of those are eligible for a discounted drip purchase price? or do you need to buy them directly from the company to qualify for the discount.

Q: Hi there, this 2 week rally is starting to look look and feel a V while many market commentators on BNN/Bloomberg/CNBC seem to say we will retest the lows and possibly even go lower - more of like a U or W or L. Obviously the situation we are in as a society and economy is out of the ordinary, but as professional investors, what is your opinion on where we go from here? Is this rally the real deal, or is it a prolonged dead cat bounce? How do we interpret these moves and what are some general signals to watch out for?

Thanks for your guidance!

Q: Can you please confirm whether GICs with lesser known institutions like Equitable Bank and Home Equity Bank are insured under CDIC?
Thanks

Q: Hi 5i- I'm wondering if you know of a study undertaken on the subsequent performance of a share price after it has passed the "Death Cross" or "Golden Cross" ? Or are these just investment myths? Thanks, Ron White

Q: I'm havin' trouble getting my mind around taking loonies to buy green backs, what with the CDN dollar being so low. I have a watch list of US stocks that I would like to buy over the next 6 plus months.

I think that there certain US companies that will be good long-term buys, aka US opportunity positions.

At the same time, I understand the value of foreign currency diversification, seeing how the US dollar portfolio is hold up from the purchase of the green backs a few years ago, using the loonie.

As an option to stocks,  I might be inclined to buy US ETF hedged to CDN dollars because of the though the CDN $ will return to previous levels, even in the face of low oil prices. But at the same time, there are such few  hedged ETF that focus on niches of sectors, like say IPAY.

Bottom line, guess I just have to bit the bullet, as the saying goes, and convert CDN dollars to buy US stocks over the months to the end of 2020. And it seems a key trade off is a possible substantial rise in the CDN dollar which results in FX loss versus higher capital gains from US positions over time, right?!

What a muddled mind set situation I find myself in. But I'm keen to look for clarity.

What thoughts, comments or advice do you have for me?

...........Thanks........Tom

Q: Happy Easter to you Team 5i! Happy every day!

I would like to petition our members of a Parliament to allow writing cash-covered puts in registered accounts. Writing covered calls is allowed. Unless I have it wrong, the risk levels are identical.

If allowed, the benefits to investors would be huge.

Would you consider joining such a petition? You certainly know many in the money management business. Would you consider asking them to join?

Is there a financial planner organization in Canada? If yes, the petition I wold like to launch should come from that organization.

Please let me have your thoughts on this.

Q: This is a kind of crystal ball question. I have had trouble getting through to BMO yesterday and today. When I finally got through, the agent told me that one of the reasons for the slowness is that everyone is trying to rig their accounts for option selling. I wonder if this is a signal that the end of options season is getting close. I have made quite a bit of money on options myself in the last couple of months and would like to keep it up. But, I have a nagging worry that although I might make some money on options, if an upturn comes , I may miss out on getting some good companies for the long term. I read an adviser recently, for instance, who predicted that we may not have as long to buy as we think. Things could be turning up in just a few weeks. From your experience, can you give any advice on how to look at this situation and best handle it? What signs to look for when things begin to turn, and how much time will there be to leave one strategy behind and jump on the other. I realise this is a bit like crystal ball gazing. Bu,t, you have more experience that I do in the markets and probably can foresee the future better than I can.
thanks

Q: Does 5i have an earnings calendar?

Q: Hello peter and team,
I’ve been following Peter since he use to run Sprott mutual fund. appreciate over the years how much I learned. “The BIG picture of investment “
1.Currency is another form of hedge. Served me very well till today on many occasions
2. Diversification. Surely enough I have to believe it
3. Weed stocks valuations and Big picture outlook for Energy sector in general. No regret to miss the boom and bust. Sleep well! Healthy investment ha!
Here is my other questions:
1 Ignore the market indexes up and down, I have 50/50 split between S&P/Nasdaq( actually tech portion is over my 50% as SP has 25% tech), what’s your outlook the growth and earnings for the tech sector compare to the rest of the groups during the Q1 2020? Less impact or nearly the same as overall market
2 when people overstocked toilet paper instead of shopping for good companies in stock market in March, thinking about post virus investment strategies, What we learned from WFH, human can’t live without tech. It has changed humans life forever? I remember the article your investment thesis is simple, buy apple or blackberry? Go to the mall and airport have a look.
Looking forward to reading Peter’s articles on financial post !
Thanks you and team, keep up the great service

Q: Retired dividend-income investor. I'm sitting on 15% cash that I created by taking profits and harvesting some losses. I have mapped out how to redeploy this cash to hit my asset allocation targets, both by sector as well as by individual holding. I had originally designed the re-entry on spreading the purchases over 6 months. Given that we now have information on different countries indicating that they MIGHT be showing signs of COVID slowly recovering and that the stock market is forward looking, would you adjust the 6 months time frame to 4 months? What's your crystal ball tell you...redeploy a little faster?

Also, the above equities are those that are candidates for topping up. Which would you hit up first?

Thanks for your help...Steve

Q: Hi Peter
What are the pros and cons of buying CLF vs actual laddered Govt bonds.
Seems CLF is easy to sell--but is there more risk in a down market?

Q: Peter
I know you have said that the stock market may start going up before this crisis is over and confuse and confound investors. Well I am one of those investors. If as the Royal Bank said this morning millions of dollars have been pulled out of mutual funds in the last several weeks, I can’t imagine that it is those people getting back in the market or is it? Where is all the money coming from to buy stocks? What is the stock market anyway? Institutions and individuals buying and selling to each other to try and make a buck? I read once that the world could do without oil before they could do without the stock market. Do you believe that?
Post if you want. I am sure I am not the only investor out there who can’t make sense of the stock market.

Q: Before the downturn in stock market, the stock positions my portfolios, balanced and income, were matched with target weights, for the most part, like okay. Now I am thinking about starting a new portfolio comprised of the 10 Canadian stocks listed in the 5i SPECIAL OPPORTUNITIES REPORT, dated March 9,2020, and this portfolio would represent 5% of my total equity positions. I understand that it would be concentrated rather than fully diversified but I would be comfortable with this. Rather than overweighting the positions that I currently have, I thought it best to open a separate portfolio to track these special opportunities.
My intention would be buy individual positions over time, slowly to achieve the target weight, and that the positions held for the long term, aka 5 years. And I would be using cash that is available.
I would appreciate your thoughts and comments, like anything that I should be aware of or blind sided to..........Thanks.....Tom 

Q: Dear 5i Team,

Several ETFs like HHL and EIT use a covered call strategy for portions of their investments. When markets have an overall downward trend, or are otherwise directionless but volatile, is this an effective strategy? I know that it works in an upward trending market but wasn't sure about the other scenarios.

Thanks in advance!

Derek

Q: Is there a free website that shows the institutional investors stake in public companies (small to large cap). Do you find it useful? Generally speaking, do institutional investors have a better track record at picking the right stocks?

Q: Re the couple who live on their RRIF and wished to "harvest capital losses", I hope they understand that you cannot harvest capital losses in a RRIF. Not sure if they were asking about their RRIF only or other accounts.