Investment Q&A

Q: If I buy:
ZWC ((BMO CDN HIGH DIV COV ETF) for Canadian exposure and income,
ZWS (BMO US HIGH DIV COVER ETF) for US exposure and income, and
ZWE (BMO EUROPE HI DIV COVER CALL HEDGED CAD) for European exposure and income,

that will give me about 7%+ income and exposure to about 120 very decent world wide companies. As a retiree, would I need to do anything else?

Q: Your reply to my June 8 question states "We might swap ZWH to ZWS as we prefer to go unhedged for forex return diversification." Isn't ZWH the unhedged version and ZWS the hedged?

Q: Looking to add some tax efficient income to an otherwise well diversified portfolio. What do you think of the above mentioned ETFs? Could you suggest a couple of more?
Thank you!

Q: I am sure your recent article regarding foreign content was aimed specifically at me...haha. You nailed it! My method (illustrated in your article) resulted in 35% foreign content. The Domiciled method was 10% It sparked a fair bit of inflection on how I determine my asset allocation and I am still working through some scenarios. Probably another question for another time.

Q#1 = I am a retired, conservative, dividend-income investor. If I wanted a one-stop shop USA ETF that pays a good dividend, I was thinking of ZWH-ZWS. I already own ZWC and ZWE. I like the covered call strategy, especially at this point in the market cycle. Are there others I should consider?

Q#2 = Would you go unhedged...I am guessing yes, based on your previous "hedging" answers?

Q#3 = I understand that if I wanted to buy a USA ETF, like ZWH or ZWS, that the preferred placement would be in my RRSP...due to the withholding tax issue and the "distribution" tax benefits. That, however, would require a major overhaul on a reasonably successful asset allocation already in place.

What about purchasing ZWH-ZWS in my Cash account? I understand the distribution would be comprised of Capital Gains, Interest Income, Dividends and ROC and each would be taxed accordingly....no problem. What about the withholding tax? I thought Canada had an agreement with the USA that there would essentially be no double taxation. So, if the USA withheld tax, then this would become a tax credit against Canadian tax owing...with this being reflected in the T3-T5 issued annually. Please help me to understand.

Thanks for your help...again, great article...Steve