Investment Q&A

Q: Greetings 5i Team,
on 24 Mar, I SOLD these 4 companies for tax loss capture and am considering buying them back now. I note that FSZ and EIF have recovered more quickly than AD and NFI. Also, they are all still selling below what I had originally paid.
In what order would you buy these back? Is there a company(s) among them that you would not buy back at this time?

Thank you for this excellent service.
Steve

Q: Can you please recommend ETF that is 2 times bull and Bear for day trading in Canada and the USA.

Thanks for the great service.

Q: Hi Team,
I have holdings of 800 SU and 1000 CNQ at a deep loss and would like to sell them to realize the capital losses and buy them back after 30 days. Using the sold proceeds to buy canadian energy ETF to stay in the sector. Upon 30 days later sell the ETF and buy back the SU and CNQ. Do you see this is workable and since the commision is only $7.00 per trade, so it is nothing to consider.
Your suggestion of the canadian energy ETF is appreciated !!
Thanks as always,
Tak

Q: W,Buffett sold all his airline stocks.Will it has a negative impact on EIF & Cae Txs for u usual great services & views

Q: Did Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting shows the size of its holdings of SU. Txs for u usual great services & views

Q: Good Morning
I currently have 37 positions spread over 3 accounts(RRSP,TFSA,INVEST). Most if not all are or at one time been in 5i’s model portfolios. Many of these are currently at 1.5% or less and although I believe they all have varying levels of potential their current weighting in my overall portfolio will have little impact unless they all go up. I believe I should consolidate the listed group, do you agree and if so which ones would you keep? Proceeds would be added to the remaining names.
Thank you for your continued advice and guidance.
As a side note you advice regarding non action in turbulent times is proof positive. Aside from harvesting some tax losses and buying proxies for a handful of names, my portfolio is now bordering on even for the year.
Publish if you wish

Q: Hi Peter: When I sit back and take a look at the big picture and review how my portfolio performed during COVID-19 (so far), I try to see what lessons I can learn, then turn to how to apply those lessons to make my portfolio stronger.

I am a retired, dividend-income investor. I am a huge believer in asset allocation and have designed a portfolio, in my opinion, to be reasonably well diversified, although heavy to Canada. It WAS roughly 70% equities (including 32% foreign content) and 30% fixed income (roughly 15% insured annuities, 15% Fisgard Capital...both averaging in the 5-6% pre-tax range and minor cash). My equities are mostly blue chip, dividend payers, as you can see above. The 3 mutual funds are a very minor part of my portfolio, especially Eric's Energy Fund (<2%). I also receive a company pension and CPP-OAS which, when included, drops my equities to roughly 32%.

I use various metrics to monitor my portfolio, such as P/E, P/BV, P/CF, P/S, Beta, ROE, Div growth, Payout%, technical indicators like 200 mda. I am normally a buy-and-hold investor who trims/adds around a core position.

Periodically I measure how "at risk" my portfolio is relative to the overall market. I do this by prorating my portfolio using Beta. Based on equities only, I averaged 0.68 and for my entire portfolio I averaged 0.44. So, one would think that if the overall market (TSX) was to drop 30%, then I would have thought my portfolio would drop 44% to 68% of that, being in the range of 13% (overall) to 20% (equities only).

In actual fact, my entire portfolio dropped 27% from peak to trough vs the expected 13%...over double! I understand that EVERYTHING was sold off...almost no exceptions. So what do we learn from this and what changes should we consider? Do we accept that "sxxt happens" once in a while...you can't predict every event, accept it and move on? Should we consider increasing the cash component as a buffer? Or...is there something else to be learned here?

Thanks for you help...much appreciated...Steve

Q: While at home these past weeks, I notice a strange phenomenon that maybe you could explain. The Dow futures right before market open give a fairly good indication of the direction of the market for the day. So I thought, well hey, if you know the market is going to go down, would it be possible to sell early? Using MPC as an example, however, you can see that there in an IMMEDIATE 2 dollar drop in the share price at open. How is this possible? Why would an owner of the stock at 32 dollars one moment be willing to accept a bid of 29.91 with no intermediate prices at a large volume? Unless that seller was trying to move the market? Would like to hear your thoughts.

Q: According to my math TSGI is now a couple dollars above the Flutter takeout price. 112x.2253x1.54= 38.85 and the stock price is currently 40.60. What would account for this? Thx

Q: Would u buy before earning on 5MAY,since it well below its highs or
is it to much of a gamble?
tnx u.

Q: Do you know when is the deal is closing and do you expect the deal to close and if there will be any new offers?

Thanks for the great service.

Q: Could you please suggest few a) good fixed income high yield ETFs b) least volatile ETFs with some income ?
Thanks

Q: International ETF overlap query. I have the first four above now (more or less equal amounts) constituting 9.72% of total portfolio. Considering adding some more international exposure for geographic and currency diversification objectives, i.e. either VXUS or VIGI but wondering about the overlap with current holdings or should I just increase current holdings. Generally attempting to increase sector holdings in USA (fdn, ihi, hack, fivg, ipay, vbk), under-represented in Canada and more international geographic exposure. All are/will be in CDN & USD non registered accounts. Views?Suggestions?

Q: In your opinion,what are the best sectors in North America to invest in at this time

Q: Thank you for your wonderful service and great advice.
Would you be able to give me your thoughts on TC, STC, ENGH, ADCO, VHI?
Could you pick your top 3 from the group that you would add to at current market prices given a 3-5 year term. Does the balance sheet of some of the smaller cap companies scare you?
Thank you kindly

Q: I have just opened a corporate non registered account. I have a fair bit of cash sitting there doing nothing. I do not plan on needing any for many years but in case of an emergency I do want access (as apposed to buying real estate and have to sell in a short time frame). From my research it seems best to invest into Canadian stocks/etfs as apposed to foreign which I also assume the US? Am I on the right track? I understand you are not accountants and certainly do not emulate to be. I also have a call into my accountant.

Q: Hey 5i,

Incredible stuff here. Thank you.
Looking for some confirmation.
With relative balance between growth and dividend stocks.
US listed inside an RRSP. Longterm holding. Looking to buy slowly on this wild ride or if and when it plummets.
Could you recommend a starter bundle 8-10 stocks.

Thanks again!

Q: Looking to add a US healthcare stock. I currently have PFE ( 6% weighing ) and was looking to add GILD. I'm concerned that there might be some overlap between PFE and GILD - if so, can you recommend and rank some others that I can look at ? Appreciate your comments.
Thanks

Q: You often cite "insider ownership" ratios when commenting on various equities. Can you point me to a website where I could access this info or is access limited to professionals?

Q: This is in response to Donald's inquiry about converting CAD $ into US $. I've used Knightsbridge Foreign Exchange many times to convert USD to CDN and been very pleased. Its easy to set up your account and fees are approx 0.8% (or lower for large transactions) vs the banks 2.5-3%. Place a call to their trading desk and you'll be able to complete a trade immediately. They will quote you a rate, which is the spot rate less their fee. You can also place a standing order that's triggered once your price is hit. It takes about 5 days for your cash to be transferred from one account to the other. Hope this helps.