Investment Q&A

Q: Hi Peter and the fabulous team,

I know you most likely disapprove of this plan so I thought I would ask you before I proceed. I am planning to refinance our house and invest 250K in stocks in a taxable account. My wife and I have a combined portfolio of 400K in non taxable accounts. I have been a member since early on and more less follow the stocks I have been learning about from your service.And we are about 20 years from retirement. The plan is to buy 10 of the best managed companies in Canada whether or not they pay dividend and hold them for 10+ years. Now here are my specific questions:
1- Why should I not do this when the interest rates are so low and money is so cheap?
2- What 10 stocks do you suggest regardless of this crazy idea?
3- This is in a taxable account and I wonder if I do get a tax-slip for the dividends from the bank or do I have to manually find out how much I have earned in dividends?

I know and I appreciate the fact that I am lucky to have your unbiased and caring advice. Thank you very much indeed.

Q: With the health of the canadian economy looking more questionable again and interest rates here looking like they will hold or decease would it make sense to tweak a portfolio that encompasses virtually all of your model, growth and income stocks and increase holdings of REITS and/ or bond etfs? With health care and tech about the only sectors showing some growth, it is hard to foresee any 6-9 month stock price appreciation n th other areas. As usual your perspective is appreciated. By tweak I mean add about 5% in total by taking say 1-2% from places like energy, gold, financials.

Q: I currently have the following breakdown by percent for each savings plan: RRSP -28%; RESP - 13%; NRSP - 59%. Within each plan I hold the following asset classes:
RRSP: 5% Can. Eq.; 25% Intl Eq; 70% Fixed Income and cash
RESP: 20% Can Eq; 20% Intl Eq; 60% Fixed Income
NRSP: 92% Can Eq; 8% Intl Eq; 0% Fixed Income
Within my NRSP account ATD.B, HCG, GIL, SJ make up 65% of my portfolio.
Would the concentration of these 4 companies be a concern?
Note that I have had exceptional returns for the past 3 years and it is largely due to these 4 companies which I have all owned since 2000.

Q: Hi there. Can I get your opinion on WEF. Western Forest.

Q: I wanted to comment on a question asked by Fred about DRIP - I hope this is acceptable.
Wanted to say that DRIP has really served me well over the years. As a longterm holder, DRIP has helped me in two ways
1) some of the companies offer a small discount to market price (although this advantage is being cancelled, sadly)
2) more importantly, If you just leave the DRIP alone you will avoid the temptation to "time the market". Through DRIP, I was still buying great companies at bargain prices right through 200-2009. Not sure I would have had the guts to do that with cash (actually I know for a fact I did not!). Psychologically, for me anyway, DRIP keeps me on track and out of trouble with my long-term holds. It has worked out.
Hope this is useful to some. Good luck fellow investors!

Q: Hi Peter, at what point would you step into Jean Coutu or am I best to look elsewhere as this stock may continue to be out of favour after another earnings miss?
Thanks Rob

Q: I have an expenditure of approximately $10,000 USD due in December of this year. Should I be buying USD today or in the near future? I have been reading about a significant downtrend in the CAD.

Q: Would you mind commenting on the implications of CRA's tax proceedings against Silver Wheaton?

Q: Today Peter asked about the Sector of each stock within the Balanced Equity Portfolio.

You listed:
AYA - IT.
TMX says "Amaya Inc is a technology company....Sector: Consumer Cyclical." (Under the Company tab, Industry Classification section.)

http://web.tmxmoney.com/company.php?qm_symbol=AYA:TSX


ENB - Utilities
TMX say "Sector: Energy".
http://web.tmxmoney.com/company.php?qm_symbol=ENB:TSX


I was surprised that the TMX site stated ENB, ALA & TRP are listed as Energy but yet FTS is listed as an Utility, as ENB has lots of utility and ALA has some also.

I have not looked at the others from 5i's Balanced Equity Port.

Have a great day.

Stan

Q: Hello Peter & Co,
How is one suppose to interpret these types of responses to clients' letters, eg:
1. Engineering: you prefer WSP now better than STN because it is behaving better after its recent acquisition; you then proceed to make a switch in the balanced portfolio
2. Gold: you prefer AEM now better than G but you keep G in the balanced portfolio
What do we do? adopt the flavour of the day or hold both?
Auto parts: you prefer MG and I prefer LNR; so I hold both
Transport: you like TFI and I own CNR; should I also hold TFI?
If I kept doing that I would end up with a much larger portfolio of stocks.
I would not mind that as long as my grey cells are working (age 72).
Antoine

Q: I notice FSV and Colliers stocks continue to do well post split. I would like to reenter my positions or is it more prudent to wait as 5i thought might be a good idea to wait a couple of quarters. If I do reenter a 2.5 % in each company would be okay? Jay Hennick and company seem very good at creating shareholder value long term.



Thx Blake

Q: Peter and 5i Team,

Conducted review of my portfolio and I would greatly appreciate your assistance in order to rebalance my portfolio.

Consumer Cyclical presently represents over 15 % of my portfolio and I’m looking to trade one of the following stocks BOYD, DHX, WPK and CGX in order to bring the weighting within approx 10%.

Technologies: Presently owns OTC, CGI, and ESL which represents 10% of my portfolio. I’m looking to add MDA, DH and ET for a mix of growth and income. As well, I took a 20% hair cut with OTC and I would like to know if it is worth holding.

Material: Presently we own SJ. Looking to add either G or AEM to increase my weighting to 5%

Energy (4% weighting): Looking for a dividend stock that would complement WCP, XEG.

Thank you for an excellent service.

Sylvain

Q: What are your thoughts about carmanah, you mentioned in a response to an earlier question it could be suitable for high risk investors, what makes this a higher risk company? It seems to be in the midst of a successful turnaround, great insider ownership, historic metrics are not great but looking forward things look quite rosy. Is it just that its a show me stock but you're paying for some of those results already?

Q: I'm trying to decide which one of these two forestry companies is the better choice - in terms of a combined return (dividends + growth). Can you help?

Q: Since joining 5i service I've been tracking my portfolio gains and loses. My question is around cash additions and withdrawls from the portfolio and how to calculate total return including these transactions. Could you help?

Q: I noticed an early redemption of my Superior Plus Conv Debt on June 30th.
Should I have been given advance notice of this?
Mel

Q: I'm wondering what an A+ company would look like. Would it look something like Disney DIS.US?

Q: Hi 5i team,

All my GICs mature in July and August. They make up <5% of my overall portfolio. Rates are very low (typically 1 year: 1.3%, 5 year 2.0%). There is even talk of a further interest rate cut in Canada.

Should I just split the cash 20% for each of 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 year terms, or do you have a better strategy in the current interest rate environment?


Paul J.

Q: Just an FYI, I think your the month end P&L for the portfolio coverage PDF needs to be split adjusted for GIL and MG (maybe others as well I'm not sure). It's showing negative returns where these stocks have been going up.

Q: What hedge fund would you recommend. My take is they protect on the downside as well as providing opportunity on the upside. Is this correct, if so sounds like a place I want to be. Thanks for your help.