skip to content
  1. Home
  2. >
  3. Investment Q&A
You can view 3 more answers this month. Sign up for a free trial for unlimited access.

Investment Q&A

Not investment advice or solicitation to buy/sell securities. Do your own due diligence and/or consult an advisor.

Q: I would appreciate an update on your views about VMO. In the past, you have indicated support for the momentum factor strategy, but recommended that investors avoid ETFs with less than $100M in AUM. Given that VMO has an inception date of June 2016 and only $29M in AUM to date, do you still see this ETF as a good investment or is there another international momentum ETF which you prefer? Also, would this ETF be appropriate for a TFSA account?

Thank you for your insightful advice.
Read Answer Asked by Dale on September 15, 2020
Q: Hi team,
I currently have holdings in the above companies and ETFs, and with the exception of MAG I am up between 12-90% on all of these. I am thinking that I should take some profits to reduce my exposure in the gold and silver sector.
Are there any of these that you would recommend getting out of, or would I be better to pare down my holding in each to get back to an acceptable percentage of my portfolio?
Also, if I was to hold some of these longer term, say 1-3years, can you please rank them in order of which you would recommend holding for that length of time.
thanks as always,
Paula
Read Answer Asked by Paula on September 15, 2020
Q: Very interesting your list of "Buy and forget" growth stocks in response to a question today. At some point you also had a list of "Hold forever stocks".

Which ETFs could be used to cover these lists, at least in good part ?

Gratefully yours,

Jacques IDS
Read Answer Asked by Jacques on September 15, 2020
Q: Hi 5i team,
Could you please recommend ETFs that invest primarily in US small/mid cap biotech, medical equipment/pharma and digital/IT companies? Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by Willie on September 14, 2020
Q: First, I wanted to thank you for your Canadian portfolio suggestions, especially for the balanced and growth ones. I've been very lucky on timing, still I am extremely happy with the service, advices and the gains this year. On another note, I am looking to allocate 10%-15% of my locked-in RSP in either an international or global well managed portfolio composed of small cap and/or mid cap stocks. Looking for intelligent high risk. I have a long time horizon (I am 30 years old). I would prefer actively managed or an ETF you strongly believe in, diversified and with a strong track record. I had MAW150 in mind, but when I look at the top 10 positions individually... They are pretty much all at their all time high and I'm not sure if they have a lot more room for growth ahead this year or next year factoring all the risk that remains. I know it's almost impossible to time the market, but if I can dodge a speculative correction like there was for tech this week, I would be more than happy. All that said, which one(s) would you recommend considering the most for September 2020 based on your expertise.
Thank you again.
Read Answer Asked by Michael on September 14, 2020
Q: I’d like to dip my toe into doing a bit of technical trading. Are there signals that you prefer to use, and is there a specific kind of security (maybe an example) that this type of trading might work better on? Also, would this work for ETFs? I’ve been watching VGG using the MACD but I don’t think it’s a good candidate since it tends to trade in a narrow band and the signal seems to be too late getting in and out.

Thanks.
Read Answer Asked by Alan on September 11, 2020
Q: I am biased to see gold continue to move higher as we get closer to the US election. Particularly if Biden wins, since Trump will no doubt contest the results and pretty much do all he can to remain in the White House beyond Inauguration Day, resulting in heightened volatility.

At the same time, I could also see a scenario where the US$ rallies on the back of a FTQ bid amid this volatility.

So does one add to gold exposure with the view that the US$ rallies in the coming months? Or do you think any potential uptick in gold will be mitigated by a stronger US$?

And if you were to be relatively bullish on gold, would you buy, say, XGD, or would you add a company like FNV or ABX?

Thanks in advance.
Read Answer Asked by Trevor on September 10, 2020
Q: If you were to start an resp now, would you consider these etfs as suitable or a combination thereof,or do you have alternatives? Thanx.
Read Answer Asked by Steve on September 09, 2020
Q: Hi 5iTeam,
Please recommend 2 stocks and 2 etfs in each of Canadian and US markets with or without dividend, for a 25 to 30 years hold.
Cheers,
Read Answer Asked by Harry on September 09, 2020
Q: REITs are beaten down. For a long term investor who wants real estate exposure, is this a time to get in? Can you suggest (1) two or three REITs or other entities and (2) an ETF for this? Thank you!
Read Answer Asked by Chris on September 08, 2020
Q: Hi Team,
Is there a ETF similar to VGRO but sold in $US without converting to Cdn? I have some cash on the US side of my RRSP and like the set up of VGRO but would rather not convert back to Cdn at this point.
Read Answer Asked by Todd on September 08, 2020
Q: The rise in stock prices of a few mega-caps (Apple, Facebook, Amazon, etc.) has distorted the concept of broad diversification through index investing (S&P 500). While the index rises, many index constituents have performed poorly.

Some ETF providers have created funds that hold a subset of the components of existing indices. Inclusion is based on their concept of company "quality". Presumably this eliminates poor performers and results in a "better" fund.
Examples are: ZUQ, SPHQ, QUAL, ZGQ, ZEQ.

Please comment on this idea of "quality" subsets of existing indexes. Do you consider this to be a useful investing strategy? Would you consider the examples listed to be preferable investments compared to the broader indices?

Thank you.
IslandJohn
Read Answer Asked by John on September 08, 2020
Q: I have a TFSA with about $33K that I plan to give to my daughter for graduate school in about 2 years. ZWU looks like a good investment, with YTD return of -14.25% and yield of about 7.95%. Would appreciate your comments on ZWU and any other suggestions you could provide.
Thanks!
Read Answer Asked by Grant on September 08, 2020