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 have no fixed income in my portfolio. I'm 63 and have been retired five years. I'm still a fairly aggressive investor and need some appreciation from my holdings to fund my lifestyle. In this low-rate environment, I have little interest in bonds but would like your opinion on preferreds. The new issues seem to have addressed the reset problem. Is this true and can you provide some names with a nice return, reasonable safety and possibly trading below par. The last criteria is the least important.
Read Answer Asked by Kyle on August 23, 2016
Q: Hi Peter,

I am 43 years old and my portfolio closely tracks your balanced portfolio. I also have exposure to the us and international stock market. I am at a point that I have enough contribution and exposure to the stock market and I do not plan to contribute more. I also have real estate exposure by owning my own home in Toronto. Now, I am looking for new investment vehicles to invest my disposable income. I have 10 year time horizon. Any general suggestion? I am willing to consider alternative ideas ( e.g. willing to buy a property in the US). Thanks for the great service.
Read Answer Asked by Ron on August 23, 2016
Q: Peter and Ryan,
I read recently that you feel the consumer discretionary and consumer staples sectors should be top priorities in a conservative income investor's portfolio. Would you please suggest 3-4 companies in each sector that you currently think would provide well balanced sector representation. Understanding your focus is Canadian companies, if possible, I would appreciate 1-2 American companies be included as well. As always, thanks for your most appreciated guidance.
Read Answer Asked by Les on August 22, 2016
Q: Hello Peter et al.

I have a question regarding stock manipulation. I hear people mentioning about brokerage firms selling small lots of 100 shares to try and keep the stock price down. How does this work for the brokerage firm? Are they not losing money unless they are shorting the stock? If they are not shorting the stock would they not want the stock price to rise to make money? How does this theory work?

Thanks but confused,

Brendan
Read Answer Asked by Brendan on August 22, 2016
Q: Cleaning up a portfolio: I want to know where I could have ideas on how I go about to clean my portfolio. I have too many stocks (losers and winners) in both registered and non-registered accounts. Obviously, I could sell the less promising losers and winners. But I was wondering what are, if any, some of the guidelines as to how to proceed, how many stocks is optimal for a portfolio (around 20 from what I gather so far). Moreover, I have some losers that amount to few hundreds of dollars and would be costly to sell with the commission of 9,99$ per transaction. So I would appreciate pointers and references (books or website) to help me sort things out.

Thanks to you and to the members that would be kind enough to help.

Jean
Read Answer Asked by Jean on August 22, 2016