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Investment Q&A

Not investment advice or solicitation to buy/sell securities. Do your own due diligence and/or consult an advisor.

Q: Hi Peter & Ryan,
Would appreciate your opinion on simplifying my mother's portfolio. The portfolio is worth 600K and I currently hold the following ETF's. VCN, VFV, XSP, VBAL, VGRO, VVL, XIN, VEE, XWD. I definately have duplication and believe I can downsize to 3 ETF's VBAL, VGRO and I like XWD for their global allocation and sector weighting.
Thoughts? And would you put 200K in each one?
Thanks,
Steve
Read Answer Asked by Steve on February 12, 2019
Q: Hi

Im planning to invest an etf(VFV) for my wife for a retirement fund(15 yr horizon).I will be doing it for 100/week.Just want to ask your opinion at which acct is better to put it for tax purposes.Also can you recommend other ETF’s that I can pick?

As always your comments are greatly appreciated.

Thanks.


Read Answer Asked by sunday on February 12, 2019
Q: I would liked to switch the focus of my investments from equities to ETF's. Could you give me some broad parameters for guidance.
Could you suggest 10 ETF's for starters. Mid to long term with medium risk.
Thanks for your help.
Read Answer Asked by Bruce on February 05, 2019
Q: Hi team,

My foreign exposure is held in VTI 14% of my portfolio, VEU 9% ( these two are my largest holdings) and SPOT 3.75%. Everything else is held in canadian stocks and etf's.

Since VEU also holds some canadian would you still hold this or look for one that doesn't have any cnd holdinds?

Second, is there one etf that does the same job has VIT and VEU combined?

Tks,
Rino
Read Answer Asked by Rino on January 29, 2019
Q: Sheldon recently asked a question about the 1 minute portfolio approach. You answered that you would suggest a more global ETF rather than the Canadian ETF suggested in the Globe article and that it might be a good way for an investor to create a base or core to their portfolio.

Taking into account MER, diversification, holdings and anything else you think is important, could you please suggest a global stock ETF that you feel would work well as a base/core part of a portfolio?

Could you please also suggest a global bond ETF that you feel would work well as the base/core part of a portfolio?

Thank you,
Geoff
Read Answer Asked by Geoff on January 23, 2019
Q: What Canadian listed ETFs that are invested more so in growth stocks would be suitable for a TFSA with a mid to long term horizon? I wish to have geographic diversification through one or more ETFs and one or more ETFs investing in small to mid-cap stocks. If there are mutual funds that have better performance, after fees, please list as well.
Read Answer Asked by perry on January 21, 2019
Q: If you were going to buy a basket of low cost etfs for long term (20-30 years) to hold in an rrsp what would they be? What weightings would you reccomend? Im looking to take advantage of the 8%+ annual market return for the long haul. Or would you use one of the one stop shop Vanguard ones? Could you also explain any reasoning?
thanks
Read Answer Asked by david on December 19, 2018
Q: I just transferred 100,000 from an investment company to Questrade because i'm fed up with the high management fees. I was thinking of splitting it between Index Funds and ETF's. I'm 59 and this money is in an RRSP acct. Where would you recommend I invest this money.
Thanks

Brian
Read Answer Asked by Brian on December 18, 2018
Q: Thanks so much for your reply to my earlier question. You suggested the following ETFs and I was wondering what a good portfolio allocation would be for each (I was thinking 50% allocated toward your BE portfolio however if a lesser/more percentage makes sense then please advise):

XWD (global expoure), VFV (S&P 500), VGG (US dividend growth), HXQ (US technology), XSU (US small-cap)

Thanks!
Read Answer Asked by Michael on December 12, 2018
Q: Your recommended etf list has xwd. It has a higher mer than xaw and is somewhat smaller. The return of xwd is better. What would you consider the more conservative etf?

I will pair one of the above with xic for my total equity exposure. I want to keep things simple. Can you buy into this strategy?
Read Answer Asked by Richard on July 20, 2018
Q: 5-I,
I am looking at a managed portfolio of a friend who deals at Wood Gundy. They are comparing the performance of the portfolio to the "Value Balanced Index". It says it is a blended benchmark comprised of 40% DEX Universe, 20% S&P/TSX composite and 40% MSCI World. What would be the closest ETF to this index that I could follow on an exchange ?

Thanks

Paul
Read Answer Asked by paul on April 23, 2018
Q: Only have room for one of these in my TFSA. Could you rank them?
Another question. Is there any easy way to find information on a particular investment in previous monthly ETF & Mutual Fund Updates?
Thanks again for all your help.
Read Answer Asked by James on February 28, 2018
Q: Good Afternoon, Curious as to your thoughts on starting a growth oriented TFSA with the following, and your alternative recommendations if any. Thanks
ZLB,XWD, TDB3098,TDB3099. About 20k to start which is why I have not chosen individual stocks.
Read Answer Asked by Lavern on January 30, 2018
Q: Morning, New website looks good! I am looking to improve a family members TFSA which was setup by a bank. They put her into some lame and expensive mutual funds, no surprise. Am thinking about XWD and ZLB as replacements, with the goal being balance as well as capital appreciation. Any other suggestions? Thanks, Lavern
Read Answer Asked by Lavern on November 02, 2017
Q: Have over 20 years until retirement. VVL has been a disappointment , seems to be holding too many stocks that underperform and has substantially low dividend yield compared to VCN/VUN.

RRSP Account
ZUH 10%
VVL 7%
ZGI 8%
COW 10%
XWD 6%
ZLU 7%
ZLB 7%
VXC 5%
ZID 2%
VUN 7%
CWW 9%
XGD 6%
XIT 8%
Cash 8%

What would be your top 5 etfs for a long term hold?
Read Answer Asked by Thomas on August 18, 2017
Q: My average annual return based on 5i guidance is 13.3% over 8 years. Can't argue with that. Thank you.

Question: XWD, for example, is a global ETF which invests in 5000 companies around the planet, which has returned a very steady (almost a straight line) 13.09% since inception.

So why not sell my 40 stocks and simply buy a combination of:
- XWD (growth)
- CBO (fixed income + security)
- XGD (security)
and call it a day? This would have returned say 11% - 12%.
Pretty close...

Maybe this should be addressed on your ETF site, but I thought it was worth asking here.

As usual, thank you for your sound advice.
Read Answer Asked by J Carl on May 01, 2017
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