Investment Q&A

Q: I recall once seeing a link to an explainer on all of the different Brookfield offerings. Can you please repost this. Is it up to date with the new BAM / BN thing?

Ideally hoping to see a tabulated summary including:
name of holding
nature of business
yield
ideal account type to hold in for optimal tax efficiency
closest competitor names

Which offering would you recommend for green energy income investment in an unregistered CDN$ account? Any comments on when is a good time to buy given recent structural changes and interest rate changes.

Thanks,

Jim

Q: In my RRIF I own shs in Bip.un and Bepc.
Would It be better for a combination of growth,income and more variety of assets to switch the above to Bam?

Q: Why the big volume today and continuously falling price for BIP.UN of late? Any insight?

Q: Do I have this straight ? As a ( Canadian ) holder of these two non American ( Bermuda )stocks, effective January 1/23, when I sell them, I will be subject to a 10% withholding tax and will be required to file a US tax return ?

WOW !

Q: Hello Peter, Apologize as i know you have addressed this but i am still confused. I would appreciate it if you can answer each of my concerns to clarify.
1. I hold both bep.un and bip.un in RRSP and TFSA. Will there be withholding tax as of Jan 2023 in both cases and if so, is the 10 percent tax on dividends and capital gains only ? If this is the case, I am assuming the brokerage would use the ACB to calculate the gains.
2. Would it better to sell both of these and redirect monies into BN and BAM
3. If i decide i don't want to deal with the tax , can i simply exchange both for bipc and bepc and if so, am I not losing as the prices of bipc and bepc are much higher and dividends are lower yield wise
4. Lastly if there is withholding tax on tfsa and rrsp, how do we recover it..
5. Could the tax just be on tfsa and not rrsp as rrsp is normally exempt from any withholding of dividends etc
Sincere thanks and happy holiday season..

Q: 11:23 AM 12/13/2022
It seems that the Brookfields are nothing but trouble from a taxable perspective and the new withholding tax may make it worse. The brokers will naturally take the withholding tax and it will be a fight to try to claim it back.

My question however is about the exchangeability of BEP.UN and BIP.UN into BEPC and BIPC. Can these exchanges still be made?

If I get my broker to do the exchanges does this become a taxable capital gains event? If so it is prohibitive for us as we have huge capital gains in both BEP.UN and BIP.UN which would prohibit the exchange.

Any suggestions on what to do?

Thank you......... Paul W. K.

Q: Will these be subject to proposed tax if held in tfsa?

Q: I hold the above stocks in my RRSP. I understand that as of January 1, 2023, the IRS will require a 10% withholding tax when Canadian residents sell a limited partnership. Does this only apply to US based partnerships? Would it apply to BIP.un or BEP.un? Does it apply to partnerships held in an RRSP? It appears this could apply even if you sold at a loss. Thanks for your advice.

Q: Just received a letter from my discount broker advising of changes to US withholding tax on distributions and dispositions starting January 1, 2023 that "might" apply to Canadians holding publicly traded partnerships in any account, including RSPs. As a long-term holder of both BIP and BEP, I have significant capital and gains on both. These are held in an RSP, so I have never been concerned about any tax implications. But now . . . ? The Brookfield site advises that they "do not expect" non-US investors to be subject to any withholding tax, and there is also a letter from their tax lawyers with the same claim with a bit more positive wording, but it ends with a disclaimer (hey - we could be wrong!)

I do not want to sell either BIP or BEP, but it would annoy me more if I ended up losing the withholding tax on distributions and (particularly) dispositions. Not sure how the IRS can withhold tax on a Canadian selling a non-US based company, but obviously there is a way, as the letter came from my Canadian big-bank brokerage which also has a significant presence in the US. Also assume that with the stocks being in an RSP, there would be no means of recovery through tax credits.

I would appreciate any comments you have on this matter. If the stocks should be sold, it would have to be done this year. Would this problem also apply to BIPC and BEPC, if I just did a switch?

Thank-you, Grant

Q: Hello, I know your are not tax expert, but I risk myself asking because I am sure other members will receive a similar letter from their online broker. This is about the new US regulation code 1446. The letter I received today says:

Changes to the U.S. Taxation of Publicly Traded Partnerships.

New US regulations taking effect on January 1, 2023, will result in new withholding taxes for sales of publicly traded partnerships by non-US account holders.

Once these rules take effect in 2023, when a non-US national sells an interest in a publicly traded partnership, 10% of the gross proceeds of the sale will be withheld. The withholding taxes will be remitted to the US Treasury, and the non-US national will be responsible for filing a US income tax return and claiming any potential refund of the amount withheld.

Not all publicly traded partnerships will be subject to withholding. However, at this point it is difficult to say which publicly traded partnerships will and will not fall within the scope of the new rules...

I did phone my online broker to know more. I was told that I have two companies in my account affected by this: BEP.UN-CA and BIP.UN-CA. Even if they are held in a RRSP, these will be subjected to the new tax if I sell after January 1, 2023. I argued that these are Canadian companies, but they replied that because they are limited partnership and trade on both the Canadian and US markets the new 1446 regulation will apply.

According to what you know of Brookfield, is that true that this new tax will apply on both BIP.UN-CA and BEP.UN-CA starting from January 1, 2023? Thank you,

Q: A full analysis please. In my opinion the metrics are not good however it is being rated a buy by analysts. I am curious as to your thoughts versus theirs. Thanks

Q: Hi, further to your answer to Nick on Dec 2nd, it is best to hold BIP.PA in a registered account (TFSA, RRSP, RRIF) as,, it is an LP and pays distributions (not eligible dividends like most preferreds) which are subject to onerous tax reporting if held in a margin account.

Q: What's the reason why BIP.UN drop so much this week? Any bad news coming? Thanks.

Q: I hold these in an RESP with the following weighting (BIP 18%, Goog 18% VGRO 23%, XAW 41%) and I am considering selling to purchase a 3 year GIC as my eldest child is approaching post-secondary education.

Which holding would you reduce?
Can you rank these holding in terms of risk?
Is there an alternative security other than a GIC that should be considered?

Thanks!

Q: Hello Peter,
I own all three. After the spinoff, I will have Brookfield Corp (that will own parts of all three, BEP, BIP, and BAM) and BAM (the asset manager). In this scenario, will BAM be direct competitor to Blackstone? Also, how is the spinoff different from the Trisura one? Lastly, the performance of BEP has not been that great so should i move on or just stick with all four for long term hold? Thanks very much

Q: This is a question further to what has already been recently answered. I also own BIP.UN and BEP.UN. As we know, post spin-off there will be the new BAM, and BN. Which one of these two would best compliment my existing BIP.UN and BEP.UN positions as an add-on ?

Is it best to buy the current BAM.A now and sell the one unit, or does it make more sense to wait after the spin-off......or is too hard to call ?

Q: Is the below option better to invest in than buying actual stock? Can notes be sold anytime or are they lockin? How do notes work in this environment? Can you please give me a brief explanation of the notes?


Brookfield Infrastructure Partners (BIP) said Thursday it has agreed to sell 700 million Canadian dollars ($517.6 million) in medium-term notes.

Thanks for the great service.

Q: Was there a dividend increase announced in their last report?

Q: Can you please rank the above utilities for Value. I used EV/EBITA data from Yahoo Finance and got this: NPI (8), BIP.UN (11), FTS (12.7), BLX (13), BEP.UN (15), NEE (26), AQN (28)
Thanks!

Q: Hi 5i
5i's thoughts on the quarter and current price vs valuation - I have been scratching my head with this one for a while ....the market keeps trading it down, even with the decent certainty of inflation protected future cash flows. Appreciate your reply.