Investment Q&A

Q: Hello:

I would appreciate if you can recommend some small cap Canadian Technology and Canadian Health Care stocks.

I would also appreciate if you can add the following Canadian Mining stocks to my watch list:

Canadian Zinc (CZN)
Polyment Mining (POM)
Excellon Resources (EXN)
Golden Predator (GPY)

Thanks a lot. Yasmin

Q: Well, the mining stocks are way up again today, and some analysts are talking about a bull market in commodities. I hold gold and oil only. Would you advise venturing into any of the other commodities? And if so which and what company?

Q: Matt's question about the U of T pension plan also sounded to good to be true to me so I looked on their website. The pension does not provide the value of the full salary, but rather what I've pasted below from the website:

1. Highest Average Salary/Wages is the annualized average of your highest thirty-six (36) completed months of
salary/wages, while a member of the Pension Plan, during your current span of employment with the University, prior to
your Early or Normal Retirement Date. “Salary/Wages” means your gross regular monthly salary before deductions,
annualized to 12 months for sessional employees and to the 100% salary/wages equivalent for part-time employees. “Gross
regular monthly salary” includes Academic Administrative Stipends, but excludes all other payments to a maximum salary
limit set out in the Pension Plan, currently set at $150,000.
2. Average Canada Pension Plan Earnings Ceiling is the average of the Ceiling established by the Federal Government for
Canada Pension Plan purposes during the last thirty-six(36) months of participation in the Plan prior to your retirement.
3. Pensionable Service means the total of all of the years you have been participating in the Plan, and any earlier University of
Toronto Pension Plans during your current span of employment (excluding participation in the historical part-time Pension
Plan prior to July 1, 1987). Effective July 1, 1987, part-time employees accrue pensionable service at a rate equivalent to
their percentage of full-time worked.
Your annual unreduced pension is calculated as:
• 1.6% of your Highest Average salary/wages up to the Average Canada Pension Plan Earnings Ceiling
• 2.0% of your Highest Average salary/wages which exceed the Average Canada Pension Plan Earnings Ceiling
• Multiplied by your years of Pensionable Services
The lower percentage app

Q: We plan to gradually tweak our (equity) holdings over 2016 to further optimize fees and diversification. Your thoughts on optimum geographic mix and how best to achieve that will be appreciated. (For context: Conservative, income-oriented portfolio, 1/3 equities, currently 90/10 Cdn/US currency and 80/20 Cdn/US stocks.) Thank you.

Q: I was recently told that if I sell my investment in AGF Fixed Income Plus fund, there was a penalty to be paid. I could not get much more info from the broker or the AGF web site.Is this a portion of their MER or can you enlighten me.
Thanks

Q: Hello, what do you think of MLPY and MLPN which I think are two ETNs traded on the NYSE? Both of them are high-yield investments correlatated to the price of oïl (if I am correct). Is it too risky? Thanks, Gervais

Q: I have 4 companies that make up a significant part of my portfolio (HCG, GIL, ATD.B, SJ). With the exception of HCG I have been trying to sell them at or near 52 week highs. I have been trying to sell them since the beginning of the year and so far I have been unsuccessful. What makes these trades difficult for me is that I would be buying all these companies if I did not own them already. My question is do you use the same approach when selling for portfolio allocation reasons versus fundamental reasons?

Q: Good Morning Peter and Team,

I am in the process of adding 15% to my portfolio. Can you list in order which 7 companies you would add from your growth and balance portfolios at this time. Assume a well diversified portfolio and a long time horizon.

Thank you for all you do.

Wes

Q: When Yellen finally pulls the trigger to increase short term interest rates, do you think there may be a short term sympathy sell off of interest sensitive securities in Canada. I'm thinking utilities, telco's and reits may experience a correction in Canada. Do you think this will in fact happen and if so what sectors do you think will be most affected. Other than the lifeco's and banks any other defensive sectors you can suggest? Thanks Peter and team.

Q: Hi Peter,
I have a precious metals portfolio of streamers and producers as follows (in descending market value):
FNV, NMI, AEM, KDX, MND, FR, PG, SLW (note: PG is a near producer)
Since I am not a geologist, I have tried to discipline myself to investing in only streamers/producers that I perceive as having quality management. I believe in Pareto's principle aka the 80:20 rule regarding management. In fact, for the PM sector, it is probably more like the 96:4 rule - ie. Pareto's x 2. My question to you is this: if you were in my shoes, how would you do research on finding the top 4% management ?

Q: Do Vanguard ETF's actually own the shares in their ETF's or is it some derivative that they use? If they don't own the shares, what risk does this present? I seem to recall that there was a difference between Blackrock and Vanguard in this regard. Is that true?

Q: My wife and I have defined benefit pensions that meet all our needs. We are conservative investors looking for a 8-10% total return. I am proposing the following equity allocation to enhance our financial position and would appreciate any comments you may have. Thank you 5i team.

50% diversified blend of 5i covered stocks
15% XSP US. stocks CAD hedged
15% high yield bonds
10% ZRE real estate
10% CDZ dividend stocks

PS If I hold XSP in my cash account, would the dividends be subject to the US. withholding tax?

Q: Hello. Since I started investing, I've been told that selling covered call is the safest and easiest way to earn extra income. However, I've found that the cost of buying and selling covered call options in the Canadian stock market is extremely expensive. If the stock is called away, the bank will charge an extra $49 as handling fee per transaction for both sides (no matter the amount of the contract). Do you know if there are any investment institutions that offer no handling fee at the end of the expiry? I've heard that Interactive Broker may be one of them. Are you aware of any others? If I could switch some of my portfolio to a cheaper trading institution, do you think it is worth the hassle to sell covered call? MANY THANKS.

Q: Have difficulty understanding the sector alllocated for some stocks. For instance I thought NFI would definitely be Industrial but in my BMO portfolio it is classified as cons disc along with DOL - which I get. I want to increase my Industrial sector so could you go thru your three portfolios and list the stocks that would be classified in this sector? Thanks.

Q: What would your 3 favorite growth stocks be going forward (US or Canada) and 3 fav dividend stocks (US or Can)
Tks

Q: Hi Peter & Team!
Please could you provide some company names that should grow really well over the next 10 years and have great management teams. Thanks.

Q: Morning,

Just a question regarding how you determine returns for the model portfolios. Is it based on time weight return (Modified Dietz method), or is it a money weighted return (XIRR).

I'm trying to figure out how to determine my returns on my own portfolios, and have been using XIRR since the beginning, which do you use or suggest for a DIY investor?

Thanks.

Q: My partner and I are retiring soon on a portfolio of around a million dollars, comprised of more than 50 stocks. Compared to your Balanced model portfolio (22 stocks), the number of stocks I have in my portfolio seems to be too many. I have both large & mid cap stocks (85% of portfolio) and small cap growth stocks (15%) in the portfolio. The percentage I've allotted to each stock is not equal. Some of the smaller riskier stocks could be as low as 1% weighting in the total portfolio. My questions are (1) Is this a good investment strategy to include both balanced safer equity and higher growth riskier equity in a portfolio? (2) What should be the optimal number of stocks in a large portfolio? (3) Is there a general rule of thumb for the weighting of each stock category (large cap, mid cap & small cap)? I want to make sure that what I've done is correct, especially since we are retiring soon. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE.

Q: Hi Guys,

Am I still fine holding these companies in my U.S. portfolio, DIS, SBUX, V, HD, BRK.B and eft's SPY, QQQ, and VIG (All have a 3% weighting). 5 year time frame and low/medium risk.
My concern is that most of the individual stocks are in the Consumer sectors and I am overweighted in my total portfolio (25%) in these sectors.
thanks,
Jim

Q: I just wanted to clarify about dividends. What happens when one sells stocks before dividends are distributed? Do we lose the dividends in this case? Are dividends prorated for the period stocks are held? Is there any suggested good practice for this? Do etfs differ from stocks in this regard? Thanks very much. Shyam