Investment Q&A

Q: A highly regarded economist/strategist recently recommended going overweight consumer staples, energy and utilities for 2020. Can you please provide your top picks for these sectors considering their current valuations??

Q: I have some USD to deploy to 2 stocks for a long term hold. Which stocks would you purchase today, Appl or MSFT for tech and Cost or SBUX.
Thanks
Nancy

Q: Seasons Greetings 5i!!
About a year ago a member asked you for a sample "growthy" USA portfolio.
You responded with the above listed stocks which have returned about 35% YTD.
Would you make any changes today twelve months after you first recommended it?
Thanks for all you do for all your help! It is has honestly been life changing for us and truly appreciated!!
Regards
Dave

Q: I recently submitted a question asking what "sector" Costco and Disney were in "according to your sectors". You advised that Disney was Consumer Discretionary and Costco was Consumer Staples.
You do not have these sectors in your listings. You have Consumer Cyclicals and Consumer Non-Cyclicals. I am assuming it is one of these - could you please advise. I am aware that sectors have more than 1 description name but I am trying to keep to the sector names you have on your Summary List.
Thank you so much,
Margaret

Q: Seth Klarman has said that the greatest advantage an individual investor has is the abilty to have a long-term perspective. With that in mind, several years ago I had assembled a core 20/20 portfolio- 20 stocks for 20 years. They consist of:
CDA: TD, BNS, BCE, ATD.B, BAM.A, CSU, CGI, FTS, ENB, CN RAIL
USA: APPLE, GOOGL, AMAZON, VISA, BRK.B, MCD.

I also hold smaller quantities of utilities ( AQN, EMA, BIP.UN), small growth mutual fund (mawer global small cap) and reits for diversification. Can you help me complete my core 20/20 by suggesting 4-6 US DIVIDEND GROWTH STOCKS and perhaps 2 Canadian holdings that I should add or replace. Appreciate your excellent service as always.

Sincerely Ajay

Q: I recently asked you for 4-5 core picks for U.S. stocks and you kindly sent them to me that was appreciated. I am trying to keep my stocks organized by sector, which you have also helped me with and wondered what (based on your Sectors) Costco and Disney would be in?
Thank you so much
Margaret

Q: I need to rebalance and would like your top 3 recommendations in both Health Care and Consumer Defensive. It’s for a ten year investment window. Thnks

Q: Looking to buy Costco. In order of priority would you recommend it be from an open cash account, TFSA or RRSP. I have room to manoeuvre in my cash account but would have to do some selling in the other two accounts to initiate the purchase.

Q: Could you please give 4-5 U.S. stocks that you would consider a core holding and advise why you like them.
Thank you
Margaret

Q: I have some USD funds to invest. I would appreciate your best suggestions for 3-4 medium or large companies to keep for a long time (with or without dividends, sector not important).

Q: I am thinking of selling pbh. Do you have a US stock in the same sector that you would prefer? Or would you just hold on pbh. Thanks.

Q: Could your top 5 canadian and 5 (or less if you don’t have 5) US company for dividend growth.

For a 10 year holding
Any sector
No minimum current yield

Q: Can I please have your opinion and thoughts on Costco's recently announced earnings and is it a good stock to continue holding? Thank You.

Q: I have a small US account and am looking to add a couple of companies to it. I realize that you do not provide extensive coverage of US stocks but would it be possible to recommend a few small to mid cap growth companies with a one to three year time horizon. Sector and volatility are not factors. Thanks.

Q: I've been shopping at Costco for 20 years but never bought the stock, stupid me. Watching the news and seeing they have opened a store in China and the huge demand there. It appears Costco may have a long runway for growth in China and Internationally. With the run up in price lately, would you start a position now?

Q: With the world feeling a little uneasy about a pending recession, I want to keep only holdings that will weather a downturn. I'm not trying to time the market, and want to hold stocks, that while they may dip, have good balance sheets, good management, and will likely see a recovery. Others I will sell and hold the cash. Above are my current holdings. Do you see any that may be susceptible to excessive weakness in a recession and would therefore meet my sell criterion? Thanks,
Kim

Q: Thinking of adding either COST or WMT to our portfolio. Would appreciate your opinion as to which would be the better choice.
Thanks for your support and have a great weekend.

Q: Hi Peter and Ryan,
Lately I contributed some cash into my RRSP. I owns many Canadian companies as you have in your demo portfolios. I also have US shares of QCOM, Google, Twitter, AYX, SQ. I am thinking of adding 2-3 of US stocks in my list above. What will you recommend? Or do you have other stocks that have good growth potentials in the long term?
Thank you,
Yiwen

Q: Hi team,

I am watching WATCH. Cramer keeps coming up with new acronyms. I think he coined FANG several years ago. Cramer likes large cap consumer names with scale. So do I. I am looking for a new name in that sector to offset my large tech holdings. I already own a full Walmart position. While I like Amazon, I still view it as trading with tech sentiment, despite its classification, and I have more than enough tech. I am not sure it should be in this grouping, but I guess Cramer needed an A. I am considering Target, which I think is back on track after its foray into Canada a few years ago. I think I missed the big run in Costco. I don’t mind buying expensive tech stocks for growth, but I am more reluctant to overpay for consumer stocks. Lastly is Home Depot and it still looks relatively attractive to me here. What is your view on adding either Target or Home Depot for growth or are there other large cap consumer names that I should consider?

Thanks again.
Dave

Q: Hello Folks:
We have held Costco in our U.S. equity portfolio for several years (approx 3% of our portfolio). As It has done very well we are considering increasing our position a few percentage points. At it's current high value do you deem this a worthwhile bet. We will likely raise the money by reducing our position in Bank of America; we also hold a 5% position in J.P. Morgan. As long time Chevron investors we could alternately reduce this position for more Costco. Thanks for your fabulous service.
brian