skip to content
  1. Home
  2. >
  3. Investment Q&A
You can view 3 more answers this month. Sign up for a free trial for unlimited access.

Investment Q&A

Not investment advice or solicitation to buy/sell securities. Do your own due diligence and/or consult an advisor.

Q: Hi Peter
I have a Followup to Delbert’s question. In the link you shared, it lists the price for a new subscription to portfolio analytics. How about existing customers like me who have already subscribed to 5i research? ? If I want to upgrade to portfolio analytics, Do I have to still pay the full value of $390 ?

Happy holidays to the 5i team
Read Answer Asked by Greyhair on December 24, 2020
Q: Your thoughts on:
1. Stock Rover versus any other of your suggestions for stock & portfolio tracking sites/businesses (that include tracking Canadian stocks (e.g. TSE) stocks)?
2. How secure is it to have these companies (e.g. stock rover) track our individual portfolios? They are gathering such personal financial information on us that i imagine other third parties would love to get their hands on- How much risk of our data ($ personal holdings/worth) being shared, or not so much?
Read Answer Asked by stephen on December 11, 2020
Q: Do you know of a site that I can list all my stocks, the cost price, and number of shares and get the following information: gain or loss, with the percentage and the dollar amounts. I would like it to be in real time. I have used the TXS Money but as I have used it in the past it is not very consistent and I have had troubles with it. Hopefully you can suggest a different site. Thanks very much Dorothy
Read Answer Asked by Dorothy on October 23, 2020
Q: Looking at my portfolio, would there be any changes you would make? All of it is held in my TFSA, I'm 24 and don't require the money for atleast a few years if not much longer.
I know I'm very tech heavy but I like the exposure to high growth industry leaders. If I should adjust which would you sell/trim and which would you buy.
I also have 10k CAE shares held in another account.

Thanks, Dan
Read Answer Asked by Daniel on October 05, 2020
Q: I finally got around to using Portfolio Analytics on myself. Biggest perk was the totalling of my expected yearly dividends. Mystery solved!
Unsurprising was the overweight tech at 45%.
When one looks at the difference between REAL and SYZ (as examples of software tech) I have to wonder just how useful that advisement is as a total? It seems in software you could have proxies (almost) for the entire market!

Read Answer Asked by Gerald on September 23, 2020
Q: Good morning, Portfolio Analytics suggests we (as elderly seniors) lower our Utility holdings by 6.32%. Currently, we have:
AQN 3.9 %, BEPC 3.5%, BIP.UN 4.6%, H 2.2%, SPB 1.8%. Firstly is there a holding I could eliminate? If not should I just lower the larger percentages? All are in RRIFs.
Second suggestion from Analytics is to lower telecom by 3.54%. Currently have BCE 4.2%, T 3.5% and GOOG 4.2%. T and BCE are in RRIFs. GOOG is in an unregistered account. I have always looked at GOOG as technology sector. Any comments. Thanks for your expertise.
Ted
Read Answer Asked by Ted on August 21, 2020
Q: Hello, in the company profile of PHY and CEF, it says that their Industry Classifications - Sector is Financial Services. I was a bit surprised to see that. Could you explain why these ETFs are classified under Financial Services rather than Basic Materials? Thanks, Gervais
Read Answer Asked by Gervais on August 04, 2020
Q: Dear 5i team:
Your software indicates our family’s investments are too Canadian-focused. However, I prefer our “home bias”, for three reasons:
(a) most of our assets are non-registered, and the dividend tax credit is especially favourable for Canadian source dividends in a province such as ours (Ontario);
(b) I like supporting the companies that I invest in (e.g., we buy Peller family wines, since we own their shares);
(c) but most important, many of the “Canadian” businesses we own are surprisingly international; among our top 20 equity holdings are:
Alimentation couche-tarde (Circle K is world-wide);
Brookfield Asset Management (globally focused company that invests wherever the opportunities are);
CGI Group (revenues are 84% outside Canada per 2019 annual report);
CP Rail (significant U.S. revenues);
Fortis (65% of earning are in U.S.);
Manulife (growing Asian revenues);
Restaurant Brands International (most of Burger King and Popeye’s restaurants are outside of Canada);
Shopify (not sure, but suspect international revenues are growing faster than Canadian revenues);
TC Energy (dropped “Canada” from its name to reflect its growing U.S. presence);
TD bank (substantial and growing U.S. presence);
Anyways, the above-listed 10 stocks represent about one-third of our overall equity holdings (in absolute $ terms), but I would not consider these companies as being “100% Canadian”. I wonder whether your software could be rejigged to reflect the relative percent earnings (or revenue) contributions, broken down per Canada, U.S., Europe, Asia, and so forth. I suspect our home “bias” is not nearly as substantial as it appears.
Ted
Read Answer Asked by Ted on July 21, 2020
Q: More of a comment than a question. I so appreciate the changes to the Portfolio Tracking and Analysis. The summary at the bottom is terrific as is the up to date plus minus column. Also wondering if a column indicating the date of purchase would be another fine improvement. Is that a possibility?
Read Answer Asked by Dennis on June 29, 2020
Q: Hi Peter, Ryan, and Team,

Love the improvements to Portfolio Analytics! Wow, you folks have worked hard with these enhancements. Also, thanks very much for walking me through the troubleshooting procedure when my screen was initially blank. You correctly determined that AdBlock Plus app was the culprit, and when it was disabled for the 5i site, everything was perfect.
Read Answer Asked by Jerry on June 25, 2020
Q: I noticed a few people commenting on the vastly improved Portfolio Analytics segment of this website.

Where can I find the details of what has been changed?

TY

Sheldon
Read Answer Asked by Sheldon on June 25, 2020
Q: In his email, Mike is referring to a portfolio detail review. Where can we find it? Is he referring to your monthly report?
Read Answer Asked by Monique on June 24, 2020
Q: Love the update for the Portfolio Details.
Well done.
Sincerely
Mike
Read Answer Asked by Mike on June 24, 2020
Q: Does you portfolio allocation as referred to country investment recognize that some companies despite designated as domestic (Canadian) have and derive significant income from abroad ?
Therefore these are more diversified by the location as it appears in the Portfolio Analytics summaries.Basically the summary understates the total portfolio diversification by the country .I give the two above companies as an example but there are more companies to which this would apply.
Read Answer Asked by Miroslaw on May 27, 2020
Q: In July you had a "Portfolio Analytics Walk through and Stock Market Update" video. Is it still accessible ? I would like to review the PA Walk through part as a tutorial for entering my portfolio. Thanks 5i
Read Answer Asked by mike on October 28, 2019
Q: I am very pleased with the Portfolio Analytics, and have found it to be a quite useful tool. Thank you for building this product.

Broadly, I would like to better understand how you developed your recommended sector/geographic allocations in the Asset Allocator. In particular, I would like to understand:

1) Certain assets (e.g. gold, REITs) are missing or very low percentages. What is the basis for this recommendation in the Portfolio Analytics?

2) Most if not all broadly based core index funds have a greater allocation to financials than the 15% recommended in the Portfolio Analyzer. Why are you recommending a 15% allocation?

3) Are your recommended asset allocation percentages static, or are you planning on adjusting these percentages over time as markets change?

4) Given that markets typically revert to the mean, how do your recommended allocations compare to the mean sector percentages of major indexes, for example EAFE or the S&P500?

Any insights you can offer to help me better understand the basis for how these asset allocations were developed would be most helpful. Thank you for this excellent service!
Read Answer Asked by Dale on October 18, 2019
Q: I have a question about asset allocation. I'm 70 and don't need income from my portfolio. Currently I have 75% in equities fairly well diversified and 15% in fixed income, mostly bond ETFs (rest cash). You recommend having 25-33% in fixed income depending on how I answer your asset allocator questions. why do I need any fixed income at all if I do not need the income now or for the next few years. When I do need this income, could I not convert to bonds ? The bond funds that I have have been about neutral over the past couple of years; some have gained and some have lost value. they have paid out interest but then so have the equities to a considerable extent. thanks
Read Answer Asked by Stuart on October 08, 2019