Investment Q&A

Q: I am a retired, conservative, dividend-income investor who is normally fully invested with a "buy-and-hold, but trim-add around core positions" strategy.
I currently have 2% in investable cash, with my portfolio set up exactly where I want it now...good asset allocation both via sectors and via individual position sizes.

However, I am also looking at the macro picture and things seem to be going parabolic. I am contemplating trimming to increase my cash position from 2% up to 5%. I understand in the past you have indicated that the key things to watch are interest rates are unemployment. They are both low, so "let it ride". So, what to do...let it ride vs trim? I know this amounts to market timing, which I know you are not fond of and, coincidentally, I am lousy at.

In your past life, as a fund manager, when did you raise or invest your available cash and what factors pushed you to do something or to just sit on your hands?

Thanks...sitting on my hands for now...Steve

Q: Hedging Strategies- With the recent run up of stocks, what are the suggested preferred options to protect ones portfolio gains from significant market correction to the downside? Selling existing stocks will lead to considerable taxation in my current scenario, with most investments being outside RRSP Accounts. Please provide a few ideas.

Q: Like many CDN Investors, I am overweight Canada. Plan to reduce that in 2020. Looking at candidates I find some "Canadian" investments have the majority of their assets outside the country. Example: BGI.UN - only 20% of assets are in Canada, yet it pays quarterly $CDN income. Seems it would meet my objective. Please provide names of other CDN-based candidates that hold a lot of ex-Canada assets and derive much/most of their income from those. Looking for US/International diversity and some $CDN income. I hold some US Pharma stocks directly and a Vanguard S&P 500 Index ETF (10% of total portfolio). Thank you.
IslandJohn

Q: Hi 5i,
I am just going to ask about your new U.S. disclosure policy when Sal asked first. So, I would just comment I have absolutely zero concerns about your staff’s potential investments in U.S. stocks and the integrity of your advice. The U.S. names are typically so big and liquid that 5i’s endorsement or not, in all due respect, would have absolutely no influence on the price movement of AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, ROKU or others. So, keep up the great work and the presence of these disclaimers, or not, on the U.S. names cause me absolutely no concerns.
Thanks again for your sage advice.
Dave

Q: I have just opened a TFSA account in $US. Can you recommend an ETF or other place, to park tbe money, for a few months, while I figure out what stocks I want to buy? Thank you.

Q: As is Mike, the tracker I am using (Morningstar) does not register BYD properly. It is stuck at $202, which is the price of BYD.UN on Dec 31st. I have deleted BYD.UN and put in BYD to no avail. Is anyone using a free tracker that has the correct BYD listing?

Q: Just noticed a question from Michael about having some issues with Google Sheets function pulling quotes for BYD (Boyd Group Services).

I'm having issues too! It is not working for either BYD.UN or BYD. Just to confirm the formula to use is typically:
=GOOGLEFINANCE("exchange:tickersymbol") This is what should work, but is not currently working at the moment:
=GOOGLEFINANCE("TSE:BYD")

Q: FYI: TD Waterhouse - This is what I get when I try to buy PSA or CSAV:

This order cannot be placed electronically. Please contact TD Direct Investing ... to place this order. [ 90211 ]
This symbol is not eligible for trading online. For assistance, please call TD Direct Investing. [ 44221 ]

Gotcha!

Q: Since the change with BYD my Google spread sheet has not been able to pull in a quote for Boyd. Just wondering if other members have experienced a problem?
Thanks
Mike

Q: Good morning team
Can you steer me in the direction of some very good articles on Reverse mortgages please? I'm thinking of major upgades/renovations to my home. I spoke to an appraiser and he pointed out to me that if we hit a 10 year ish stretch of decline or no growth in realestate that it could be a very bad idea if I chose to sell??
Thanks for keeping me on track. All is going very well at this juncture.!

Q: Do you know how brokerage firms determine maximum margin on specific stocks? About a year ago one could have 70% margin on GIL but it dropped to 50% a few months ago while a much smaller company like SIS continued to have 70% margin. Just recently GIL went back to 70% margin. I thought larger companies that pay dividends like GIL generally have 70% margin.

Q: Assume that Company A buys out Company B and included in that transaction are shares in Company A.

1 - What is a typical lock-down period for these shares?

2 - Would these new holders of Company A shares need to report on SEDI, even if the holding is as little as 4%? Does it matter if these new shareholders are part of Company A's regular operations?

Thank you.

Q: Today on BNN, David Burrows suggested using the 150-day moving average to determine a stop loss point. Would he be referring to a "Simple 150-day Moving Average" and over which period of time on a chart does one apply the 150-day M.A.?

Q: You noted a couple of days ago that you (almost) always put a limit price in place when buying/selling. The few times that I have done this I find it to be very cumbersome because I then often have to wait or even check back an hour or two later to find out if I was able to purchase the stock at my chosen price. I have even missed out on a purchase because I went in too low. While it is nice to get the lowest price I am a bit confused as to your comments because you often state that it is best to purchase a stock without trying to time it too carefully because in the long run (and I am a long term holder) a few cents here or there isn't going to be material. So when do you suggest we place a limit on the buy - always, only with small caps, only when it is a lightly traded stock or just when the bid-ask is rather large? And if using a limit, how do you know what price to go in at?

Appreciate your insight.

Paul F.

Q: do you still publish 5i research SUMMARY

Q: would a 10% weight of this ETF be too high as this would be the only US ETF in a RRSP account for a young person.

Thanks

Q: Does the annualized return on these funds include the dividend?
Also, if they are purchased and held for say 5 years in a non registered account,is there any tax paid other than tax on the dividend?
Finally, if one chooses to go with the DRIP, does dividend tax still need to be paid annually?
As always,thanks for the great service.
Phil

Q: Hi team:
the money has rotated out of the Weed stocks (marijuana) since last year
the Tech stocks are doing very well, can you tell us if the funds rotated out
go to any other particular sectors (not banks, utilities are flat recently)
of the stock market ?
many thanks
Michael

Q: Often one hears an investment advisor (especially those with a long-term buy-and-hold style) say: “if you had bought $10,000 worth of company X in 1990, you would have $1,000,000 (or whatever) now. Yet, these same advisors (and this would include 5i) usually also advocate regular “trimming back” if any one security becomes overweight in a portfolio. But you can’t have it both ways!!—if you are lucky enough to get a 20-bagger, or 40-bagger, or (in my more extreme example above) a 100-bagger, you won’t get the aforementioned immense absolute $$ gain if you constantly trim back the winner(s). My own style typically is to just keep adding new $$ to my other (lower-weight) holdings, and thereby avoid selling my winners: e.g., I’ve had CP, ENB, NA, TRP, CAE, TD, QSR [via predecessors WEN and THI], etc., for >20 years, and have hardly ever sold any shares (and have often regretted those times I did sell a few shares for “trimming” (rebalancing) purposes. The only time I was hurt by not rebalancing was when AIG became 15% of my portfolio, and it subsequently imploded during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. But, otherwise, my general reluctance to sell high-quality securities has paid off. I am curious what comments 5i might have.....

Ted

Q: To all the great folks at 5i a big thank you. Our returns have been calculated for 2019 and we are up about 33.8% across all accounts! Yeah!! Total trading costs for the year about $160 + 5i subscription!!! Thanks 5i. If averaged with 2018 returns things only look "good" rather than "great" but with basically, not many portfolio changes. Buy and hold!!! Thank you for teaching me patience. Now if I could just learn to take some profits! What will 2020 bring... We will see in time.
John