Investment Q&A

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

Q: In his email, Mike is referring to a portfolio detail review. Where can we find it? Is he referring to your monthly report?

Q: Love the update for the Portfolio Details.
Well done.
Sincerely
Mike

Q: Love the update for the Portfolio Analytics.
Well done.
Sincerely
Mike

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.

Q: Good morning 5i
In your/my portfolio tracking which symbol should I use to track flutter shares?
Thanks
Jeremy

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

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!

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

Q: How is the 5i Portfolio Tracking and Analysis will adjust for the split 2 for 1? Will one have to correct the amount manually?

Q: Portfolio Analytics categorizes Sienna Senior Living as Health Care and Northwest Healthcare Properties as Real Estate (I get that it's because it's a REIT). A couple of questions:
1) Does it make sense to consider NWH.UN as being in the Health Care sector?
2) In general, does it make sense to override the sector a stock is allocated in cases like this?
3) Have you thought of adding a column to your database to allow users to do this? Using an extra column rather than overriding the Sector provided by Portfolio Analytics would give the user access to both values.
4) Same questions for Geography (see my previous question).

Thanks
Peter

Q: Hello 5i
It is great that these changes have been made to the Portfolio Analytics. The next important change would be to be able to download my portfolio with the combined positions instead of the separate ones. Adjusting the downloaded spreadsheet to having to add all the similar elements is a chore to get a hard copy of everything. Since I buy and sell with TD and monitor using Morningstar and Yahoo it makes things difficult. (I use Morningstar and Yahoo in addition to your great Portfolio Analytics as each offers a different perspective) and, yes, I do spend hours a day reviewing my portfolio but only taking action at your suggestion, when required but its is good to be hands on as nobody else would care as much as I do because its mine and not a generic assimilation from a broker!
Question: Is combining the positions available to the download in the works?
Thanx
Stanley

Q: I have been investing in ETFs for several years, using a simple 5 ETF portfolio which includes VCN (27%), XUU (27%), XEF (19%), XEC(7%), and ZAB (20%). When I use the portfolio analytics, the suggested ETF portfolio includes about 15 ETFs. Just wondering what if the added complication of the additional funds is worth the effort. I assume that yours has better downside protection as it reduces some of the concentrated sectors and perhaps has better returns? My portfolio has grown in size over the past years so I am ok with the additional work to manage the portfolio, just wanted to better understand why.

Thanks,

Q: For those interested in Shopify and Amazon there is an excellent article in this mornings National Post.
Peter

Q: Hello, Sent a question earlier and your reply is as follows;

PA recommends to reduce my technology exposure which is at 38%. Only problem is I am unsure which tickers to get rid of, like them all.

In my RRSP; OTEX at 4% and XAW at 21% not a direct tech exposure but does hold plenty of tech, just not sure how much.

LIRA: SHOP at 6.5%( recently chopped it from 9% to 5%), LSPD 5%, KXS 3%, QST 2.2%,

TSFA: CUSat 5%

Which one would you pull the plug on?

Tks

Asked by Rino on August 22, 2019
5i Research Answer:

XAW is currently about 22% technology. We like all the names here, and there is nothing stopping you from selling some of each if you want to lower exposure. XAW at 21% is a large position and could also be moved to 15% or so in our view. It has not performed so well either. If you want to sell just one we would lean to QST as the smallest and riskiest.

I should have also mentioned that PA also suggest to reduce my canadian exposure which is above 60%. That is the reason why my XAW exposure is at 21%. Having said that if I were to sell roughly 6% of XAW, can you suggest another non canadian etf to invest in? Seeing that XAW covers basically everything for my international exposure.

Thanks again!

Q: The Analytics tool suggests I am significantly overweight geographically (Canada). The tool also suggests I downsize my financial holdings and increase Consumer Defensive, Tech, Healthcare, and Industrials. Which sectors would you tackle first to increase? Please provide 2 or 3 stocks/ETFs that you would recommend to begin re-balancing my portfolio geographically and by sector?

I am a long term investor and I have evolved over the years towards buying more of the larger cap companies.

Thank you!

Sean

Q: Peter; Please tell Paul that PA is instant and up to date the second you enter any changes it is reflected in the holdings . Rod

Q: What are the various sector weights to use at the moment?

Q: Your Analytics program has provided a convenient tool to see the weightings in my overall portfolio. From this I have learned that while there are some with larger percentages I have many positions between 1 - 2% weighting. Sometimes this resulted from my having initiated small purchases and sometimes from falling share values. In any event, I wonder if I am spread too thin? I guess one part of this is that the small positions will not move the dial. On the other hand, quite often your members ask what you might recommend when looking at choosing between 2 stocks and the answer suggests having both, for better diversification.
1. So my first question is whether positions of 1 - 2 % are too small or is this good diversification?
2. In this context, my next questions are about positions of 1.57% and 1.42% in Enghouse and Kinaxis; are these positions too small and if so, which would you sell and which to keep / add to? And similarly, positions of 1.39% and 1.18% in Parex and Suncor. If these positions are too small, which to sell and which to keep / add to?
3. In a similar vein, I have one or two positions that have suffered from considerable declines in share value and there is .36 and .56 of a position. What should I do if I do not want to sell, either because I still believe in the prospects or because it is too painful to sell just now. I often see your answers suggesting you do not believe in averaging down but holding such a small position seems not effective.
4. My last question is about Constellation Software. It is of course one of the better performers and partly as a result presently I have a weight of just under 3.5%. Given its success, would you recommend adding to have a larger position, and if so, how much?

Thanks for your excellent service.

Q: I signed up for yesterday's webinar but was unable to participate live. Where may I access the webinar now? I am enjoying Portfolio Analytics, and like the new updates to the service. Thank you, Jane N.