Investment Q&A

Q: Could a covered call fund on a major index ever stop paying dividends? I realize they could plunge 50% or more in value. Thank you.

Q: What are people with a high net worth doing right now?
Clayton

Q: When I am watching BNN. The futures are showing on the side and the futures are often referred to.
I have always thought of it an a heads up leading indicator how the day would look based on trading over night but I’m not sure.

Can you explain what it actually is and how we should be using the information in som rod our decisions ?

Q: I found the earlier question about PPL prefers interesting. So my thought is to sell my PPL common and get the tax loss and buy the PPL preferrred even though the up side on the prefers is only about 100%. In doing some research I found that I do not understand the dynamics of rate reset perfers. The A is reset in 2013 and is down 2.5% today. The S is reset in 2020 and is up 7%. Both are down about the same from the issue. I would have thought that the 2020 resets would be much less valuable as they are sure to be called at the current market price and reissued at low interest. What am I missing

Q: Hi 5i - What up with the TSLA trading halt this afternoon? Is their new factory in China impacting shares as well as COVID effects on car sales?

Q: As we go through this cycle of the economy shutting down, stimulus to keep the lights on, and a restart of the economy... in Canada are we looking at inflation or deflation for the short or long term?
Thanks!

Q: Hi Peter

What % breakdown would you suggest for Horizon portfolio in cash account under current situation for new money. ( I currently have 50%HXCN/ 25%HXS/ 25%HXQ)? or suggest any changes. I don’t like bonds.

Thanks

Q: Peter, All Canadians and many Canadian businesses are being asked to
"lean-in" , and most are doing so.
Q1: If you take away its profit motive, what CAN the TMX do to help us exit "crazyville" ? ( eg: uptick rule, tollbooth for the algos, ban the shorts, etc)
Q2: If you remove "regulatory capture" from the OSC, what can they do, if anything ?
Thanks in advance for your usual unbiased perspective !

Q: Hello,

When I look at Canadian stocks traded on the US exchanges, why is there a yield and p/e discrepancy? Even after factoring the exchange, the Canadian stocks on US exchanges look much cheaper. Why is this? And should we be choosing the US exchange due to higher yield and lower pe?

Q: Hi Guys,

This maybe a naive question but I'm curious about falling prices of oil stocks. If a companies stock price goes to Zero does that mean the company is bankrupt and will go out of business? How important is a company's stock price to it's operation. We know that a stock's price doesn't always reflect a company's NAV but many oil company's stock prices are so low what's stopping a large company like Suncor from buying all the stock of cheap companies, other than that they are lousy businesses.

Thanks,
Charlie

Q: In general, when the markets come roaring back, do investors tend to load up on those companies that weathered the storm (kxs, real thus far) or promising companies like lspd or stc who are taking a massive hit?
Thank you,
Kevin

Q: If things get real ugly, do we need to worry about cash being held within RRSP with an investment dealer? What type of insurance is typically on these funds? Is it better to have cash with a bank?

Q: Hi,

A general question about a companies responsibility to update investors with respect to their business. Occasionally, companies update the market with respect to upcoming earnings and will 'guide up' or 'guide down' depending on what is happening. In light of the current chaos, it seems to me that now many companies have not updated guidance (I could be wrong, I follow the market generally...). Could you shed some light on to why not many companies have issued guidance updates? Perhaps the situation is so fluid, companies really can't update b/c they can't update with reliable numbers, or they are afraid to (make a terrible situation catastrophic), or...?

Further, are there time frames on issuing updates (X weeks before next quarter, for example) or perhaps requirements for updating if forecasts are going to be massively missed?

I'm basically wondering what to make of the few corporate updates.

Cam

Q: In 2008, short selling was banned. How did markets react after that decision ? I think their was a 20% rally ?
More importantly, do you think this will occur in 2020 ? If so how would markets react in your opinion?

Thanks,

Q: If things get real bad and multiple Investment dealers start potentially going bankrupt, does the Canadian Investor Protection Fund have the means to cover the losses? Would an investor be wiser to take cash and deposit into multiple bank accounts?

Q: Investing in this market:
- You mentioned in a recent answer that one should buy slowly into this market. What constitutes "slow"?
- You mentioned in the same answer that shares down 40% can drop another 40%. Has this ever happened overall in a bear market other than 1929?

Q: With regard to Martin's question about the safety of accounts of over $100k your response was that amounts above this were not guaranteed. My understanding is that the $100k limit applied to bank accounts, which are guaranteed by the Canadian Deposit Insurance Corporation (CDIC). Investment/brokerage accounts, however, are protected by the CIPF (Canadian Investor Protection Fund) up to $1 million. Is that not correct?

Q: Hello team,
This is a general question about metrics and about Microsoft in particular.If you back off cash and debt what is the metric for a P/E ratio with this applied and how does this comparison evaluate Microsoft and its peers.What is this metric called and how does this apply to for example CSU.

Q: I have always thought that "markets hitting all-time highs" is a huge concept that in my opinion the gravitas of which is lost on most. Because, if you have been invested across the market for some length of time, you will be up. And it seems to me it's not that rare to be at all-time highs. So my question is: Can you give some insight into how large the intervals of time are between all-time highs? I mean, generally, markets go up. But say, what's the largest interval between market highs and when was that?

Q: For fun, let’s assume that the markets will be shut down. What would that look like? I assume there would be some warning that they were to close, and that there would then be a lot of selling prior to that. Correct? If they were to close, how long might they close for, and what could we ‘expect’ would happen when they reopened? All very hypothetical, but whatever insights you have would be appreciated.
Also, today I tried to take money out of my personal chequing account, at TD, and they capped withdrawals at $2500 per person, per day. I’ve never had that before. Concerning?
Thank you.