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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: For past several weeks, International markets have been outperforming US markets. Europe, Emerging markets and Japan seem to be the standouts. Financials, particularly have done very well. MSCI Europe Financial Index is up 25% compared to -2.5% for XLF. Do you believe that this trend is not going away soon and it would make sense to diversify a portfolio with addition of European Equities ?

If so, would be your preferred route ?

What is your view on Banco Santander and ICICI Bank and whether these will be good options and serve as good proxies for these economies and markets ?

Thank You

Read Answer Asked by rajeev on April 23, 2025
Q: (1) Can you suggest an ETF similar to FEZ but that includes companies outside the Eurozone (i.e. includes Swiss, Swedish and UK companies). I am looking for an ETF that favors large caps, preferably holds not more than a hundred companies. IEV is the closest I could find but it holds over 360 companies. And VGK has over a thousand (>1200).

(2) Am I wrong to think that holding hundreds of companies tends to dilute an ETF’s performance?
Read Answer Asked by Adam on February 24, 2025
Q: As a follow up to my question on international ETFs in CAD, you pointed out ZEQ. Two questions: 1. In a comparison between ZEQ and HXX, the former is CAD-hedged, but not the latter. On performance, HXX has outperformed. Please advise your advice on currency risk, and if willing to accept the Euro risk, which you would prefer and why. 2. HXS and XIU and tax efficiency - if your preference is for XIU, please explain pros and cons and why XIU. I note in 2022, XIU outperformed.
Read Answer Asked by sam on February 20, 2025
Q: I have CAD to invest in Canadian-dollar denominated ETFs: (1) Canadian stocks - VGG. XIU XIC XDIV; (2) US ETFs in CAD FX - HXS ZUQ ZMID and ZBK and (3) - EU ETF - HXX. How to go about assessing one against the other. Is there a better ETF in each group you would prefer? Would appreciate guidance on which ones are keepers for long-term hold? How would you evaluate them?
Read Answer Asked by sam on February 14, 2025
Q: Part of our total portfolio is invested in ETFs [non-registered accounts] and one-third is in Canadian-based and Canadian-dollar denominated US ETFs. Another third is in US ETFs - spread among Large Cap Value, Blend and Growth, and SMID. The final third is in Special US ETF - IAI ZBK AIRR PAVE SHLD PPA SMH UTES AND HXX. Your advice is requested as to which ones to over-weight, underweight or sell. Please rank each category, if you would. My lean is less tech/ M7 as already own most.
Read Answer Asked by sam on February 10, 2025
Q: How do you think the European markets will do vs the US markets going forward 5+ years? Do you think the US market will outperform Europe or would you be in both markets? If so, what would the % split be?
Thanks for your service?
Read Answer Asked by Ozzie on April 06, 2021
Q: Do you have a preference between HXS.CA vs HXS.U and HXQ.CA vs HXQ.U and could you comment on HXX - would it be the same as the others with the exception of the focus on Europe?
Thanks for your service
Read Answer Asked by Ozzie on April 02, 2021
Q: Hi 5i team,
For my RRSP, I would like to invest in a developed Europe ETF. In your opinion, giving the fallout of the pandemic, would it better to invest in a broad index ETF like VE or a concentrated blue chips index like HXX? Which is your favorite developed Europe ETF for C$ RRSP? Which is your favorite Asia ETF (excluding Japan)? Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by Willie on January 13, 2021
Q: These ETF's are TRI or Total Return Index ETF's. They pay out no distributions of dividends and no ROC. I'm guessing that they reinvest all the payouts and subtract the fees. Since they do this would you expect that there is no CRA paperwork to complete unless you sell units which would trigger capital gains. What is your opinion of holding these in a passive corp as I think Canadian dividends would be taxed higher in the passive corp and these only produce capital gains? I am looking at the HXQ (Nasdaq 100) so I do not have to complete the T1135 paperwork and stay in CDN $.
Read Answer Asked by Terry on October 01, 2018
Q: I have a sizeable position in the Mawer balanced fund in my non-registered account from the sale of house a couple years ago. I have treated this as a standalone portfolio so that should I decide to use the funds for a large purchase such as another house, I do not need to make a larger number of trades to rebalance my main portfolio.

As I do not anticipate using the funds for a number of years, I have been considering replacing MAW104 with Horizon's swap based ETFs to defer any taxable income and create a balanced portfolio from the 5 funds. My thought is that over a number of years the tax savings and reduced MER may outweigh the potential returns of the actively managed fund.

My main reservations in proceeding are the liquidity of these ETFs through an economic downturn or major market sell off, and with the solid long term returns of the MAW104 fund, is there really much upside in making the switch?

Appreciate your thoughts.
Read Answer Asked by Jeffrey on May 28, 2018
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