Investment Q&A

Q: Hello folks:

Trying to understand the fees and performances for these ETFs. How come the fees for HXE is so low?! 0.27 as opposed to 0.61 for XEG? and ZEO and of course 1.50 for Ninepoints.(Understandable as it is active mgmt ETF and has a lot of turnover) On fees alone HXE ought to be a winner, no? Yet the results according to the websites don't reflect this...HXE only marginally better compared to XEG. ZEO lags so much. Am I missing something here?

Q: I use XIT as my technology proxy and NNRG as my energy proxy, both in my TFSA. My current thinking is to trim-add around core positions to meet portfolio asset allocation targets.

In general terms, what does your crystal ball say about future performance...1-2 years out? Eric thinks energy could double. What do you think technology (XIT) will do...lately it seems to be around the 30+% for a 5 year average? Just trying to ballpark their relative potential performance.

Thanks...Steve

Q: Annually I review my portfolio following a great book I read years ago, called "Master Your Retirement" by Douglas V. Nelson. One calculation I perform is to calculate the average beta for my entire portfolio.

I hold these two legacy funds. I haven't been able to find their beta for a number of years. The last data I had was 1.00 for RBF1018 and 0.40 for CIG50217. Can you check your search engines for anything more recent...thanks.

I also hold Eric's Nine Point Energy ETF (NNRG). I can't find a beta for it either. As a proxy I used the beta for XEG (2.33). Do you have anything better...thanks.

Thanks for your help...Steve

Q: Hello 5i Team

I am trying to understand which exchange where the shares of NNRG trade.
According to TMX.com, NNRG trades on two exchanges with volume on September 28 as follows:

NNRG:TCM – 1200 shares
NNRG:OMG – 2800 shares

According to NEO.INC, (Neo Exchange) NNRG traded 147,507 shares on September 28.

Questions are:

1 – What are the TCM, OMG (Omega) and NEO markets?

2 – Why would NNRG trade on these alternate markets instead of listing on the TSX or TSXV?

3 – Which exchange should I be looking at when setting a limit order for NNRG?

4 – Should I be concerned about liquidity in NNRG compared to the underlying securities in the ETF?

5 – Whys does the 5i web page show invalid symbol for NNRG?

Thank you for helping me understand the trading of NNRG.

Q: Current owner of NPP314 in my TFSA. I've been waiting for the assets under NNRG to get to a reasonable level prior to making the switch. The last time I looked, NPP314 had roughly $400M and NNRG had $1M. Last night I see NPP314 has $385M and NNRG has over $400M.

Does this match your search engine data? That's quite a jump....to go from roughly $400M combined to $800M combined! Would you agree that it now makes sense to make the switch to NNRG, now that it has a critical mass, along with cheaper fees?

Thanks for your help....Steve

Q: I currently own Eric's Mutual Fund (NPP314) and am considering switching to his ETF (NNRG). Just to understand the tracking differences, I monitored the daily movements on 3 days...May 26-28-31 (small sample, I know).
May 26 => NNRG = 0.91% vs NPP314 = 1.68%
May 28 => 1.70% vs 1.90%
May 31 => 4.93% vs 3.71%
Total all 3 days => 7.54% vs 7.29%

Can you please provide your understanding of the daily differences?
Also, is the May 31 difference, due to month-end adjustments?
The totals seems to make sense, due to the different MERs...agree?

Do you still agree it makes sense to move to NNRG (I can't find much information on the ETF in their website (or through RBC), except it is in their drop down box for options to buy, on the Ninepoint website. To me this implies that the holdings are identical)? There is only $1.1 Million in NNRG...is this an issue to be concerned about?

Thanks for your help...Steve

Q: Hello 5i Team
Using Nine Point Energy Fund as an example, when the company has three versions of a mutual fund (Series A, Series F and an ETF) how are the portfolios structured? Are the funds structured as three separate accounts (i.e. the portfolio manager purchases the same security in three separate accounts) or are the funds held in one common account (i.e. the portfolio manager purchases the a security in one account) and the returns/expenses calculated as proportional amounts?
Does either method have an impact on fees or the liquidity (using the example where the EFT version is smaller in value than the Series A or Series F) of the funds?
Thank you