Investment Q&A

Q: Hi Peter and Team:
I want to buy some US stocks.
BAC,MSFT,IBM,WMT,COST
Can you please let me know if any one of them is good to buy now?

how is LYG?

Thank you
AD

Q: I am slowly building my portfolio as per your guide lines.Currently looking at communications [telephones]I am looking at Telus and BCE. Do you have a preference? or would you recommend something else. Thanks Leonard

Q: If we get a 10 percent or more correction in the coming months would bond etfs or high yield bond etfs be a place to hide. Thanks.

Q: Can you please comment on Canamax Energy and if it is a good buy at these levels. It is a fairly new company with a very small float. Also could you give me a 12 month target price.

Thanks Steve

Q: what are your thoughts and comments on FRC- vs - CDI ? thanks

Q: Hi Team : John O'Connell made some very critical comments concerning yield energy stocks. He basically trashed the whole sector, with the exception of WCP. Thoughts , rebuttal?

Q: Regarding portfolio weightings: The Globe and Mail portfolio will tell you what % of your portfolio any given stock is. Entering all stocks with your buys and sells into one portfolio will give you the %s across all accounts, but sector weighting is not available. Still, not bad for a free service.

Q: Hello Peter and Co.
I'm looking at your equity model portfolio, but I can't find the book value of your holdings; are they staring me in the face but can't see them?
Regards,
Tony

Q: Peter
I sent question earlier with a URL to access a "Free" look pdf of quantitative Analysis on how Investor behavior timing the market & selecting advisors whose primary aim is not their client, gives poor results.

The URL got hashed up pretty bad.

To find this PDF put "QAIB.COM/public" into google. The second item you get has a tag headline Freelook pdf. If you click on it
you will immediately get a popup banner at the bottom of your screen asking if you want to open or save. Either way you can save it.
Sorry for the miscue, but it is worth a read. They analyzed a ton of data on mutual fund in & outflows to assess how investors & their advisors performed.
Regards
Ernie

Q: Hi Peter and team,

I'm looking to overweight CDN Energy. I currently hold Crescent Point Energy, Canadian Natural Resources and Pembina Pipeline. I'd like to add Tourmaline or Baytex, but I find them expensive. Can you recommend another producer that I should look at either on the nat gas side or heavy oil side?

Thanks,
Jason

Q: In your analysis of C-COM (CMI)you mention that 17% of revenue is sourced in the Russian Federation.With the issues in the Ukraine I am wondering how you weigh that in your investment decision. The company looks very interesting as an investment and the share price looks reasonable especially with all that cash to deploy. But how does one allow for the geo-politics in an investment decision?
Thanks
Mike

Q: VXS... VIXS Systems

Earnings release 5:00 EST today. any hints as to what we might hear?

Thank You

Gord

Q: Please comment on CMI's Q1.

thanks,
Sandy

Q: Hi Peter and Team:
My self-direct RSP account still has the following mutual funds:
AIM925/924
MFC838/837
I am able to sell the mutual funds this year without penalty. It was recommended by our previous financial planner (bought in 2007)
My question is should we keep it or sell it now? if we sell it, what is your suggestion to replace mutual fund at this moment?
thank you so much.
adriana

Q: STX, Seagate on nasdaaq. I am nicely over 60% on this one. Should I sell and move on or hold for long term. I bought at $32. with 5% div. Thanks. Helen

Q: Regardng Mike's question concening monitoring holdings, RBC Direct Investing has a tab which will give you the dollar amont and the percentage of portfolio for stocks held in all accounts. I find this quite useful. It doesn't, however, have the stocks categoized in sectors. But, for no cost it is a pretty useful tool.

Q: I have a small holding in EGL-UN and am thinking of adding. Would like your opinion.

Q: Hello Peter
I have read the comments on FLY and would like your opinion of SNA as a possible speculative play.
Thanks for all your work.

Q: Re: Mike's question regarding portfolio consolidation – Publish if you think it will be both useful and comprehensible !

I have found a couple of things helpful to monitor our 8 portfolios (TFSA's, Rif's, RSP's, Unregistered accts).

1. We use TD's Webroker and in addition to the formal individual account information it reports and updates daily, it provides a Portfolio Management feature that allows you to manually set up your own portfolios. Other brokerages may provide the same. This is useful, not only because you can set up a consolidated detailed portfolio (not provided by TD in their formal reporting) but also because you then have access to additional reporting analysis that is not available on the formal individual account detail provided by TD. Once these portfolios are set up, providing you are not a frequent trader, they are easy to maintain – just have to enter in buys and sells as they occur. I have set up one portfolio that is a consolidation of several individual ones, to see the overall picture of all accounts. I also set up individual portfolios which mimic the individual formal TD accounts in order to take advantage of the additional analysis info available through the reporting features.

2. Unhappily, however, the reporting does not (in my opinion) provide a good analysis feature for sector weightings . After (finally !) paying attention to Peter's repeated insistence that sector weightings were critical to successful investing, (Thank you, Peter !), I searched for software to provide this but with no luck. So, I had to bite the bullet and set up a custom spreadsheet to give me this information . I download each account direct from TD Webroker (they provide this capability – I assume other brokerages do, too) . I then determine which sector the stock belongs to (I use a total of 11 sectors and give each sector a number). I have a column in the spreadsheet where I put my assigned numerical value for each stock as well as a column that shows the name of the sector. Using the sector identifier, I have programmed the spreadsheet to then calculate for each account what the total weightings are for each sector. Weightings could also be calculated for the total of all accounts but I don't bother since as long as each account is weighted appropriately (I do some variations, depending on what goals I have for that account), then that's enough for me. This was something of a pain in the neck as it has been a good number of years since I have worked with spreadsheet software, however, now that it is done, it only takes about 15-20 minutes to download and to adjust, if new stock buys/sells have to be sector categorized. I do it on a weekly basis to keep up-to-date . It has made a BIG difference in my ability to keep on top of things in a time efficient manner.

Q: Hi Peter & Ryan
You may have seen a quantitative analysis of Investor Behaviour's contribution to results, along withAdvisor contributions. A sample pdf here:
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEMQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.qaib.com%2Fpublic%2Fdownloadfile.aspx%3FfilePath%3Dfreelook%26fileName%3Dadvisoreditionfreelook.pdf&ei=mSJNU6SKEKep2gXCoIHwAg&usg=AFQjCNFwWBetw8xOGdROK8RQS4BwUts0Hg&sig2=-lpwYJX6Bs3EFHAV-aUgvA&bvm=bv.64764171,d.b2I

It is a long read but makes many good points which appear often in your Qs&As with quant backup. It has a soothing tone.

Post to view at your discretion

Regards
Ernie