Investment Q&A

Q: Dewflation--it may sound weird but my greatest feat is an outbreak of deflation, perhaps world-wide.

In deflation, I know to avoid commodities but what else to avoid and what to invest in ---how do you handle investments in deflation.

Bryon in Elmira

Q: I have just recently tried to find value stocks to invest in and am currently watching about 40 stocks and I would be interested to know what you consider to be the main value indicators to watch such as P/E ratio, debt to cash flow ratios, state of balance sheet etc. I would also be interested to know what indices you consider important before making a decision to buy a particular stock. For example, a P/E ratio below 20.. You may well have been asked this question before and if so please refer me to your response. Thanks

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Q: Can you comment on the fact that BNN Market Call takes place during the trading day and not all of us can be watching while we are at work. I have frequently come home to see their picks and I an interested in a stock, but find it has traded up 10% or more just after the pick is announced on the television. This seems unfair for those who cannot watch. Do you have any pull with the BNN producers. Maybe we can get them to air it at 1:00 after the market has closed. Do you have any advice for other than to wait to see if the stock trades down to a reasonable level before buying?

Q: Hi, Maybe an odd question but wondering about your thoughts on using Beneish m-score and Altman z-score in the stock screening process for a long term investor.

Q: Can you explain how you calculate ROE, using as examples a couple of the companies for which you have written reports?

Q: With respect to Shyam's query Aug 27 regarding resources for fixed income/bond investing I found a book by Hank Cunningham entitled "In Your Best Interest: The Ultimate Guide to the Canadian Bond Market" to be quite informative. Mr. Cunningham used to be a frequent guest on BNN and I believe is well respected.

Q: I'd love to find out what you guys think about the Zero Hedge Financial Blog?

Some of it may seem fairly insightful but then you'll come across 15 tweets or articles in a row that sound reactionary, doom and gloom, zombie apocalypse is upon us and that immediately get disproven the next day. I'm having a tough time getting a handle on these guys. From my perspective, it seems like their moments of clarity and genuine insight is later ruined by pandering to an audience who is waiting for the markets to go to zero. Its weird, cuz Catherine Murray follows them on twitter and she strikes me as being very conservative (I guess though just because you follow someone on twitter doesn't mean you agree with their viewpoint).

Anyway, your thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.

John

Q: I use the Bloomberg app on my iphone to track my portfolio. You can set up watchlists for your holdings and in the summary tab you get a breakdown by industry, asset type and location.

Q: Good Morning Peter, Ryan, and Team,
This is regarding a question that another 5i Member asked about portfolio allocation tracking websites or apps. I just recently switched from TD Direct Investing to BMO Investorline. I discovered that BMO Investorline cleverly takes your account holdings and automatically generates a portfolio sector allocation pie chart and also shows the accompanying list with the percentage allocated to each sector. This is displayed at: Home / My Portfolio / Allocation Charts. This is not a plug for BMO Investorline (although I do really like it) but it is clever and saves valuable time. Hope this is helpful. DL

Q: Hi guys,
Do you know a good app or website that I can use to track my portfolio and sector allocation? I used to subscribe to GlobeinvestorGold and they had a nice portfolio analyzer that I found handy.
Thank you,
Brent

Q: I have bumped into to two fund managers/portfolio advisors in the last week, and I talked to both about their investing styles. Both said they were sitting on a lot of a cash that they have built up over the last couple months.

One also said they were selling there winners ex/ ATD.B and planning to pick it back up at a lower price.

Do these fund managers know something that retail investors don't?
It seems like professionals sometimes say buy and hold, meanwhile they are selling.

Or are they taking a guess and going for it?

I am very patient long term holder and don't trade very often, but I am curious who is doing all the selling in market down turns?

Cheers, Colin

Q: Recently you had quoted in this volatile market, you put in stink bids. If the future is pointing to a lower opening, would it be better to put the bids in before the market open?

With all of the people selling recently, if I was a seller, I would have sold a third of my portfolio for less than I had paid for it. Are a lot of people selling at losses?

Are a lot of these people being forced to sell because they are on margin?

Thanks,
Dennis

Q: When I see the futures market way down like it was going into Monday's open and there is a stock I am hoping to scoop up at a lower cost am I better to put an order in at the "market" price or to enter an actual dollar amount before the market opens?

Q: is it possible you can explain more on algorithms which are very complex computer programs to buy and sell stocks that kick in when certain parameters are reached.and how they work against a retail investor like myself. I think there was a lot of this yesterday. dave

Q: What do you think about having a stop-loss in place? Many investment gurus say to use them but most, if not all, of my stocks would have been taken out today with the drop in the market. And while most recovered to where they are marginally down, if they hadn't I would have been wishing I had put the stop-loss in!

Your thoughts?

Q: Woukd like to add to John's comment regarding trades not going through CIBC investor's edge. I have accounts at both TD and Scotia discount brokerages.
At 8:45am Monday morning I could see the carnage about to happen and I put in "market orders" for CCL.B, CNR and EMA at both brokerages. I would have been very happy just to buy at the opening prices. The Scotia trades were "rejected" and at 9:40 am I got emails saying the trades could not go through. The TD orders just sat there, not being executed. At 10:00am they were still marked as "open". I had to cancel all the orders and reissue them just after 10:00 am. This time all the orders were filled instantly. I am frustrated with this to say the least, as I left thousands of dollars on the table in that 40 min or so that my trades would not go through. CCL.B in particular had a big swing in price. Is there any recourse for me? Any way to avoid this in the future?

Q: There were some big swings in lots of 5i covered stocks today, not just CSU. I'd like to add my thanks for the "Don't Panic" message up top! I almost regret not dabbling a bit in some buying today but I wonder if it's early for that game. I am assuming this could go on for some time. What do you think?

Q: Short Selling: I was wondering about Short Selling in this down Stock Market. What are the details in the placing the order and then coverings the order later. You can give an example to provide clarification. I understand, you have to pay the dividend while the Short is on. Herbert

Q: Hi Peter,
I'm trying to learn from the rout this week. And so far all I've learned is what I don't know about corrections. I kept clear of bio stocks, because everyone said they were expensive. I got rid of all oil, gas and mining stocks. I tried to select quality low beta stocks. And still, I got hit worse than the indexes.
Among my stinkers: Kroger, Colliers, WSP Global, CCL Industries, Disney, Currency Exchange, Interpipe, and The Keg. Even DH and ATD got hammered. Meanwhile, other stocks I would have expected to get hurt like BCE, DHX or Knight, sailed through, and XBI was actually up today... In fact XBI has performed much better this week than most of the above! So what do you do to be as safe as you can in volatile times other than getting out of the market?

Q: In a reply recently, you mentioned that there is no sign of a capitulation yet. Will you have a posting when you think capitulation has, or is, happening. Thanks