Q: I’m 72 and retired, I would appreciate your view on investing in Canadian long term bond etfs, I plan on purchasing TLT in my U.S. account and was interested in purchasing a Canadian long term etf as well…..I appreciate your views, thank you!
5i Research Answer:
While we would be quite comfortable buying long term bond funds right now, and can suggest TLT and XLB (for Canadian) it does require a belief that interest rates have peaked. Long bonds have the most leverage to interest rates. If rates do not drop as expected, losses on such funds can be amplified. TLT, for example, is still down 8% over one year even with very significant rally this month. A spike in inflation would hurt these funds quite a lot. Thus, we see them as much more aggressive fixed income holdings. That being said, we do think rates have now peaked.