Investment Q&A

Q: This is not a question, but a comment. Many years ago I read "One Up on Wall Street" by Peter Lynch. My main takeaway was to look around me. As a shopper I hate Loblaws since there are always bare shelves and they seldom have what I want. If there is a special, they are sold out within hours on the first day. This has gone on for many years. In contrast, Metro always has what I want and sometimes more. Therefore I own Metro and have done well by it.

Q: Hi Peter and Team
Your advice on options, specifically covered calls is very much appreciated. Some time ago you had advised on opportunities in the US market for selling covered calls. As I believe that with the US election done that there may be some return to normal, is this a good time to again consider selling calls and could you advise 3 Canadian and 3 US shares that might offer good premiums ?
Thanks so much for the ongoing advice. Peter

Q: Good morning
there has been several questions at various times regarding parking money for short periods example 3 months or less
most times you suggest GICs or PSA or high interest accounts
would a short term money market fund be appropriate and if so can you suggest some with liquidity on a daily basis
What are the risks of such funds
the intent is to have this money available for purchasing stocks at short notice
If not any other ideas would be welcome
Thanks

Q: I understand that you are generally not in favour of averaging down.
How do you feel about averaging up ?
I am interested in any conflicting similarities of reasoning.

Many Thanks

Q: I own a number of Canadian dividend paying companies (ENB, TD, BCE, CNR, CM, SLF) in a taxable account. Is there a downside to "journaling" these stocks to the US side in order to be paid these dividends in US dollars? It would allow me to reinvest in other US listed companies without having to exchange money.

Q: Hello
I have noticed this with other companies but in the VEEV profile, under Share Information it shows Institutional Holdings at 152.7%. I'm guessing this is due to short positions or Stock options but would appreciate clarification.

Thanks, Greg

Q: I was wondering if a managed portfolio account with one of the "wealth management" departments at a large Canadian bank (RBC, BMO etc.) is charged transactional fees for securities buys and sells in addition to the quarterly % fee?
In other words, if a stock is purchased in such an account is there a "hidden fee" added to the ACB (adjusted cost base) for the transaction?
I've noticed that on the monthly statements the "unit price" for purchasing a Canadian equity usually has 3 decimal points for the unit cost. That leads me to believe that they are including a fee in the unit price which distorts the unit cost. Am I wrong?

Q: Dear 5i
Between my wife and i , we have 3 RRSP and 2 TFSA accounts and 1 unregistered account .
In terms of stock picking for each account how would you go about choosing your stocks based on having 6 different accounts ?
For example i`d like to own 1-2 utility stocks per account and maybe 1 bank stock per account . Would you say that i`d be better picking a different bank / utility stock for each account OR just pick the 1 or 2 of the best stocks per category and have the same "best " stocks in each account ?
Thanks
Bill C

Q: Are you able to provide a 5i model portfolio for US equities only?

Q: Hello 5i team,
In a November 16th answer, you mentioned GSY, PHO, GH and QTRH as potential go private companies. What would make them « ripe » (ready) to be bought? What characteristics (size? Slowing growth?) would help to know that a go private transaction might happen let’s say in the next year? I am surprised you included GSY (starting soon auto financing) and PHO (some new management recently) on your short list as they seem to still have growth avenues and no financing problems.
Thank you for your collaboration, Eric

Q: Is there any advantage/disadvantage to buying a US listed stock in your Canadian RRSP account as opposed to buying US dollars and buying the stock in your US RRSP account?

Thanks for being such a great source of information.

Q: It appears that SJ has been buying back shares in Sept and Oct. Is this normal or usual for SJ? Obviously when a company does this they think the stock is undervalued and it's best use of capital.

Q: Good morning folks, I would like some food for thought regarding a TFSA. Over time my TFSA has morphed into a Tech account which isn't so bad given recent sector performance. I am generally pleased with overall portfolio balance but feel that some diversification in my TFSA would be advisable. Would you please suggest which sectors (ranked if appropriate) are best held within a TFSA with a bit of colour commentary. Thank you so much for your input. I find the Q&A section truly great brain food. Have a wonderful weekend!

Q: One of my portfolios I run a leveraged that is currently about 2.5x leveraged (stocks :equity). More than half of the portfolio are dividend companies (overweighted beaten up real estate) and then tech at 20% with the rest diversified value/blue chip. This is a riskier portfolio than an average RRSP but in the context of my entire net worth and other business/real estate assets it is 5% and so I am okay with the risks.

That being said, after we have had big moves upwards, what might be some of the ways I could hedge or pay some small insurance premium for protection? I could simply sell off some of the portfolio, and also take capital gains but would be losing that longer term leveraged exposure that I see as the economy rights itself and to allow my value stocks to play out.

I know the big hedge funds can use options on CDS but what could a private investor do?

Q: I have a RESP and have both the VGRO and IWO what would be the next best ETF for this account? At what $ value would you start to buy stocks instead of ETF? It has 15 years to grow.

Thanks

Q: Any idea when Peter’s next BNN appearance will be?

Q: Have you ever of this company (worldmarkets), are they available to Canadian Clients, and what do you think of their published performance, it looks unrealistic. Thanks
https://worldmarkets.com/aimanagedaccount.html#account-safety

Q: The market reaching new highs while we are still in pandemic mode has me moving more defensively to take some profits now, and move to holding more cash (yup- i know i am not supposed to try to time the market, but is this not another version of buy low and sell high instead?) . What do you think about using cash to buy 5-10% of my total portfolio with so-called black swan investments, rather than having cash sitting around waiting to be deployed for the next market drop?

Q: Hi, Just a general question about Market Call guests. Do they approach BNN about appearing on the show, or does BNN aproach them about coming on the air. It looks like fantastic exposure for attracting business
for the individual and their firm, thanks?

Q: What source do you use to assign a "Sector" label to a specific company? Do you group similar sectors under your labels? Can you elaborate on the process you use in your portfolios?

I attempt to apply sector labels to individual companies in order to track sector weightings and maintain an awareness of the level of diversification I am achieving.
Keeping the number of sectors to a reasonable number (10?) requires grouping of stocks.

Currently I am using ; Consumer C/NC (10%), Finance (20%), Health Care (10%), Energy (10%), Industrials (10%), Technology (20%), Telecom's (10%), Utilities (10%). Industrial's and Consumer C/NC usually get a mix of companies thrown in there. The weightings are my loose guidelines, and I do vary from them quite a bit. i.e. Energy is currently at 3%, Tech at 40%.

I have a struggle controlling the Tech weighting due to positive returns of my holdings and the fact that so many innovative companies use technology in conducting their business and thereby are classified into the Tech Sector. (E.g. REAL is within the real estate industry however is placed in the Tech Sector.)

Any thoughts you can offer to provide me with a healthy perspective are appreciated. Thanks.