Investment Q&A

Q: Your thoughts on Q4 and annual earnings. Do Special charges seem reasonable?

Q: All three companies reported yesterday. Can you review results for each with special attention to any strengths/weaknesses? Any surprises? Outlook for stock performance going forward? How strong is 5i's conviction in each (rate out of 10).

Q: Long term owner of KXS. Happy to be a patient long term investor as long as the investment thesis is not deteriorating. Are you seeing any signs in their numbers that KXS business is deteriorating or getting disrupted? Revenue growth, margins, new customers, any other metrics that you feel are relevant to the question.

Thanks.

Q: As one of 5i’s early subscribers, I find it a useful thought experiment to give my answer to a question before clicking on the 5i answer. I have found over the years our answers converge and so I rarely send in questions and comments. However my sense is that DeepSeek is a significant change.

On one level it is a clear lesson in the reality that, as Keynes said many decades ago, it’s real resources that matter, not money.

The American approach to AI development was that if you don’t have a $1billion you're not in the game. The Chinese have shown that if you have the pool of talent, amazing things can be done with relatively little money. The prevailing narrative that the Chinese are just copy cats was also blown out of the water. DeepSeek not only upends every assumption underlying the American approach to AI, it shows that the Chinese can out Silicon Silicon Valley and that means that, unlike in the past, China’s most talented minds will want to work for Chinese companies not American ones.

How will the Americans respond? Having staked political capital on the $500 billion Stargate, Trump and his entourage of billionaires have no choice, they will double down. We are hearing the narrative already, they are now saying that $500 million invested in DeepSeek’s advancements will produce even more amazing advancements in AI.

At a moment in history, as America consumes itself, China has taken a leap forward. Not only have they bloodied Trump, they have shaken the world in ways Napoleon could never have foreseen.

There are actually lessons to be learned in how Canada might deal with Trump but the political bobble heads and corporate Canada have actually come to believe the myths of neo-liberalism they started purveying in the 80’s, and are now incapable of rising above their paralysing fear.

Every investor has to ask, what are the implications of DeepSeek for their investments? Doubling down by the Americans will keep the party going for a while but it seems reasonable to expect a reckoning. Where would 5i look for alternatives to AI investments? Please suggest 5 US and 5 Cdn stocks that have strong balance sheets and reasonable growth prospects (without stretched valuations) that would benefit from using much less expensive AI? Also, please suggest a couple of ETF’s for Europe and China that would benefit should those markets surprise to the upside?
Mike

Q: I have money to invest and I own none of these stocks. Could you list them in order that you would buy them today.
Thanks for you help.
Dorothy

Q: Hi Everyone!
I am thinking of selling my Kinaxis holdings and moving the proceeds into DSG for better growth . Your thoughts?
Cheers,
Tamara

Q: I apologized to your vast readership. KXS is down because I recently bought some. D-B

Q: I'm over weight Technologies with the following securities KSX, SHOP, CLS, TOI, PLTR, CSU and NVDA. If you had to sell one or two which ones would you sell, or would you trim some from each and keep all?

Q: Follow-up to my earlier question about any news for the drop today. You indicated no news. I was hoping for more than this. Can you provide some thoughts on why it's down? I don't think its profit taking as the stock hasn't been a great performer recently.

Q: Any news why KXS is down over 5% today (Wednesday morning)? I don't see anything that explains it.

Q: Looking to invest new funds in SMID CAD. Do not need income - lean to Growth. On a risk/reward ranking, from this list or any others you prefer, please advise where you would focus investments for 3-5 years hold.
Thanks

Q: Are there any stocks out there today that you feel are stupidly mispriced and could get a nice bounce/run this year?
Thank you

Q: Hi 5i

Please as many questions as needed.

I am heavily invested in stocks and want to raise cash, putting more money into bonds. I have about 10% in Canadian oil and gas, 5% gold stocks, and about 13% in uranium stocks. I am going to hold my gold and uranium.

What allocation would you suggest for a retiree in terms of portfolio holdings of gas and oil?

I am concerned about the possible coming tarriffs and the effect on the Canadian ecomomy. Most of my holdings are Canadian. A lot of these are in dividend stocks. I have held them through the past few years but I do need to increase the allocation to conservative investments. I plan to reduce most by about 20% or consider outright sells. I currently prefer to reduce downside risk than worry about the upside.

Can you help me decide from the viewpoint of possible tarriffs and effect on the Canadian economy which are at risk the most. Could you class these as hold, reduce or sell. I will hold all my U.S. stocks which are about 15% of my portfolio and haven't listed those here.

Thank you for your very helpful advice.

Q: How would you rank the following four companies at current valuations? Which ones would you be comfortable buying a full position in?

Q: Is this stock a buy?

Q: I am only interested in holding Canadian Long Term Compounders. I am looking for companies with decent ROIC, ROE and good balance sheets and preferably owner/operators with skin in the game. In the Canadian space of my portfolio I hold CSU, ATD and TFII. My question is could you provide to me 10 small and mid cap Canadian names that you would feel would make the best long term compounders to hold for at least 5-10 years.

Q: Hello,

What would be your top mid-cap stocks for both the CDN and US stocks for contribution into TFSAs?

You're often asked for small-cap companies so wondering if we could go up a notch in the rankings to see what your thoughts are....

As always, many thanks for your help and wishing you well in 2025!

Q: I have gains and outsized weighting in CSU, DSG, WXM. Planning to rebalance in the new year. I have been building positions in LMN and KXS and have a gain in those. I'm down and have smaller weightings in PBH, BYD, BEP.UN, AW. Which of these 6 would you suggest to add to in 2025?

Q: Hi,

Just getting ready to transfer funds from my cash account to my TFSA. I currently have a portion of LMN and KXS in a cash account. I have a larger cap gain in LMN. Which of the two do you feel would be best to move
Into a TFSA. I have the room to move an entire amount of either, but not both.

Or is this a coin toss? The cap gain isn’t much, so really doesn’t matter in the long term. As both have run some in the last month, the decision isn’t as easy as it was when KXS was laboring. Thx

Q: Hi Guys

Thanks for all the amazing work you do to support us investors. Putting new money to work and looking out on at least a 3 year (tend to be a buy and hold investor) which of the four stocks would you buy today looking at total return? If you could rank them from your most strongest being 1st that would be great.

Thanks

Stuart