Investment Q&A

Q: Could you give your overall current opinion of Darden. Is the debt situation improving?
Thank you.

Q: Could you expand on this please? "I like EIF and hold it in greater amounts in my non registered account where I intend to keep it but expect it will be dead money for at least 6 months while Northern Mat recovers."

Q: Hi, Referencing the recent questions on GSY, here is some color from CIBC on the rationale for their Downgrade to Neutral. Please publish, at your discretion, with or without your comments.

"Downgrading Go Easy To Neutral"

"After reviewing draft regulations for the new interest rate cap, it has come to
our attention that a consultation process was recently completed examining a
further reduction to the rate cap. The timing of the consultation was much
earlier than expected, and we are left to wonder if it was scheduled
intentionally to conclude in advance of the 2024 Budget. We have no basis to
speculate on the outcome and no proprietary insight on the decision-making
process of the Finance Minister’s office. However, we fear that a political lens
might be more appropriate in assessing the probability of further action on the
interest rate cap than an academic one. There has clearly been some forward
progress on this file and it simply doesn’t feel prudent to maintain an
Outperformer rating on goeasy in advance of the Budget. We are
downgrading GSY to Neutral and maintain our $160 price target.

Our concern, however, is that decisions of this nature can sometimes be influenced by the desire to achieve political objectives rather than engage in a balanced assessment of a complicated issue. The considerations described above did not prevent the government from taking action on the initial reduction to the interest rate cap, and our concern is that it may not stop it from taking action to reduce the rate cap further.

We believe that the first sentence of the draft regulations may be somewhat revealing regarding the federal government’s sentiment towards instalment lenders:
“Predatory lenders take advantage of some of the most vulnerable people in our communities, including low-income Canadians, newcomers to Canada, and those with limited credit history—often by extending very high interest rate loans.” Describing instalment lenders as “predatory” sounds almost adversarial or outright hostile, in our view.

Bottom Line

In our view, the range of potential outcomes appears to be skewed asymmetrically negative. On the one hand, the federal government could elect to take no action and this would become a non-event to shares of goeasy. At the time of writing, we believe that this outcome is already priced into the stock. GSY shares have run up nearly 50% since late October (i.e., the same month that consultations were launched) and the P/E multiple has normalized back towards long-term averages (see the line chart in Exhibit 3). This suggests to us that there is little evidence that public market shareholders are bracing for an adverse outcome.
On the other hand, the federal government could take a heavy-handed approach and reduce the rate cap further. In this scenario, the magnitude of almost any reduction would likely be meaningful to the earnings power of GSY. "

Q: The marijuana business is not really my “thing”; however, this firm’s recent results are confounding my preconceptions on the state of the “weed scene”. Are they worth further analysis?

Q: thinking of bottom fishing energy with bias to natgas , which producers
would you consider most undervalued.
thanks

Q: Down this morning because of a rating down grade. Do you consider this a buying opportuity? Thank yiu

Q: Do you see any issues with buying the CDRs for some of the large cap US stocks (i.e. Google, Nvidia) if one does not have a US dollar trading account? Are there any downsides? They seem like a good option as they are USD hedged.

Q: on Jan.24 I asked for a% by sector for a balanced portfolio and then on the 29th for a % by sector for a growth portfolio. You gave the same answer for both. Is this correct, I would have assumed tech for example would have gotten a higher % in the growth vs the balanced

Q: We recently sold our rental units and are considering adding CAR.UN to our income portfolio for exposure to Canadian residential units and rental income. I'm curious about your thoughts on valuing Canadian REITs. What specific factors or metrics do you consider when determining if a REIT is in value territory?
TY

Q: Any reason you are aware of for the drop in gsy?

Thks
Marcel

Q: Hi 5i
I could not find Maplebear inc in you r data base.... Could you provide any insight/opinion to the following comments by wolfe research and the possibility of a potential acquisition ....

" the stock has rallied 13% so far this year, aided in part by a Wolfe Research analyst call last week that suggested Instacart could be a good acquisition target for Uber. Instacart last week declined to comment on the rumor. "

Thx
Jim

Q: Thoughts on Boeing given recent developments? Are you buyers at these prices?

Q: My only 2 TFSA holdings, held in equal amounts are WELL ( down) and EIF ( up ). I like EIF and hold it in greater amounts in my non registered account where I intend to keep it but expect it will be dead money for at least 6 months while Northern Mat recovers.
Am looking at selling EIF and along with my $7,000 contribution buying CALF , GLXY, and LMN in equal amounts, leaving WELL the largest holding at approximately 40% weighting ; the others at 20 % each. My TFSA is approximately 4 % of my total non registered and RRIF accounts and is not considered material so I wish to rebalance it towards stocks with more growth ( and risk ) potential.

I tend to go crazy with market timing : any advice on how to proceed on the sale and purchase of these? Any potential “ flashing red lights “ with this move ? Thanks. Derek

Q: What happened to SNOW in late 2021 that caused the downturn and why has it not recovered?
Do you expect it will recover?
Do you still like the stock and what would be a good entry point?

Thanks Joe

Q: Dear 5i team.
I'm sure there is an answer to this in the archives, just not sure how to search. Maybe with AI, you folks can give us the option of searching like a google search? IE with a sentence vs needing to know ticker? (May put some of the folks out of work, so understand if this is not a high priority. :)

Can you tell me which US or Global ETF is focussed on building arms and munitions for military purpose? I'd like to take the aviation part out if possible, as I'd prefer to stay far away from Boeing for the time being.

Many thanks for your help.

Q: I am looking for a Canadian equivalent of the US MOAT etf.
May be an ETF with the same investment approach

Raouf

Q: Hi, do you have a good site or reference where one can go to "compare current values to historical averages". I agree that is great info to see!

Q: Good Afternoon,

When using the 60/40 etfs (VBAL, XBAL, ZBAL) in an RRSP, what would you consider to be the most prudent way of splitting up +$100,000 for a long term hold (30-40 years)?

Ie:
100% in one etf?
50/50 split between two etfs?
3 way split between three etfs?

And in general, at what dollar value in a single 60/40 etf do YOU start to feel uncomfortable?

Thank you!

Q: possible to get a list small to midcap of what you might consider "cash cows"
thanks

Q: Hi

What do you recommend for a TSX listed ETF that is ex-Canada and ex-USA for global exposure?

Thanks,
Robert