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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: Hi 5i team,
Apart from investing in stocks, bonds, and real estate, high net worth individuals and pension funds also invest in 'Alternative investments'. What are alternative investments? And how can individual retail investor diversify and buy into Alternative Investments? Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by Willie on June 04, 2018
Q: RBC direct investing is offering a private placement at $76.15 while the last trade was at $78.24, does it make sense to place an expression of interest. Secondly what does the following mean. " Please be advised that if you participate in this new issue offering, RBC Direct Investing will receive a selling concession equal to C$1.43 per share"
If i expressed interest in owning 1000 shares would i actually get less? Please help me understand the math and logic behind this?
Read Answer Asked by Brian on June 04, 2018
Q: I own a taxable portfolio that is focused on Canadian stocks that have a track record and plan to grow dividends. Over the last 9 years my portfolio has seen dividend growth of about 6% per year with very low taxes thanks to the Dividend Tax Credit. To get geographic diversification I have looked to the underlying assets and revenues of the companies. So while my portfolio is composed of 100% of Canadian listed stocks - the underlying assets/revenues are about 50% Canadian and 50% US/International. Do you think that this is a reasonable way to look at diversifying geographically - in the event of a weakening CAD should this help CAD returns (and hurt returns if CAD strengthens)??
Thanks
Read Answer Asked by Gary on May 30, 2018
Q: "How would one make a small investment in the providers of stablecoin or basecoin ?
Thanks for your hard work."

In addition to your great advice I would avoid all coins except Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Ethereum at this time. Many are scams. Many are digital tokens and not cryptographically secure. I would not consider buying any until you have some understanding of how they work. Warren Buffet does not buy what he does not understand, but that does not mean Bitcoin/Blockchain cannot be understood. Those wanting to acquire a technical understanding should consider the book 'Mastering Bitcoin: Programming the Open Blockchain' by Andreas Antonopoulos.
Read Answer Asked by Marco on May 28, 2018
Q: How would one make a small investment in the providers of stablecoin or basecoin ?
Thanks for your hard work.
Read Answer Asked by George on May 28, 2018
Q: Hello,
I have my accounts with Investorline. I have access to research reports from both S&P Global (quantitative stock reports) and Morningstar Equity Research as part of their service. Are these a good source of information or would you have any red flags that I should be aware of before using these as part of my research?
They also provide analyst ratings and target prices which I always take with a grain of salt. I know in past comments 5i doesn't view these favorably but do these offer any value to investors or should we just ignore these?
Reason I ask is there are always guests on BNN that do not view analysts very favorably for independence and other reasons. After hearing this many times, it gives one pause.
Thanks,
Dan
Read Answer Asked by Daniel on May 28, 2018
Q: I have a sizeable position in the Mawer balanced fund in my non-registered account from the sale of house a couple years ago. I have treated this as a standalone portfolio so that should I decide to use the funds for a large purchase such as another house, I do not need to make a larger number of trades to rebalance my main portfolio.

As I do not anticipate using the funds for a number of years, I have been considering replacing MAW104 with Horizon's swap based ETFs to defer any taxable income and create a balanced portfolio from the 5 funds. My thought is that over a number of years the tax savings and reduced MER may outweigh the potential returns of the actively managed fund.

My main reservations in proceeding are the liquidity of these ETFs through an economic downturn or major market sell off, and with the solid long term returns of the MAW104 fund, is there really much upside in making the switch?

Appreciate your thoughts.
Read Answer Asked by Jeffrey on May 28, 2018
Q: Looking into RRIF s. When one converts RRSP to a RRIF, is it as easy to transfer between brokers or are there some built in downfalls one should avoid? My concern is being stuck with a firm one lose confidence or faith in.
Read Answer Asked by david on May 25, 2018
Q: I recently asked: "f had $500,000 invested in the Income Portfolio balanced exactly as it was in 2017, how much money would I have earned in 2017?"

Your answer was "The income portfolio returned 9.28% in 2017; so $500,000 at the start of the year would have earned $46,400. Note our portfolio returns do not include commission, so your actual return would be slightly less than this depending on your commission charges to buy/sell.'

y follow up question- Does that figure of $46,400 include the dividend pay out, or just the appreciation of the portfolio?




Read Answer Asked by William on May 23, 2018
Q: Why do most Asset Allocation models or discussions include BOND funds or ETFs but not GICs? Is not a laddered portfolio of GICs an alternative ?
Read Answer Asked by Gordon on May 17, 2018
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