Investment Q&A

Q: Peter and Associates,

I read your responses to members daily and find them most interesting and highly useful. My question this morning has to do with Spin Master(TOY). You regularly get questions on it and from what I read you think rather highly of the company as an investment.

With technological advances, we are seeing a lot of changes in the retail landscape due to impacts in buying habits and preferences at all age levels. Reading your comments on Corus is a good example of change and the consequences suppliers must adapt or at least deal with. Toys are Us just announced it went into bankruptcy protection. No doubt more than one factor explains why.

As grandparents, what entertains today’s children is rather different to their parents! Might TOY become a victim of this change and could Toys are Us prove to be a form of leading indicator? Or, might more typical business explanations or Amazon explain the problems at Toys are Us?

Beyond the obvious potential impact from the loss or cutback of a major distribution channel at the retail level, is/are there reason(s) for concern that suppliers to the toy market will be facing serious headwinds? Or is this simply a front line retailer facing viability problems in a changing landscape?

Thank you

Mike

Q: Hey 5i,
What's you current thinking on CSCO. I like the dividend and the space it operates in. Is the balance sheet still strong.
Regards,,

Q: I have just sold my sailboat to a US buyer so they proceeds are in USD and my wife has had primarily US clients lately. To integrate this into my portfolio and maintain by target balance about 75% of it needs to be converted to CAD.

I know forex is difficult to predict but would appreciate if the CAD run-up is overdone or if it is supported by predicted pace of interest rate hikes in Canada vs the US and likely to maintain its current level for a while.

I can do 3 transactions to meet the threshold for reduced exhange costs at my online brokerage and was planning 1 this week and then 2-3 months down the road to do the next.
Thanks.

Q: Please explain the significant price differential between Canadian gas and oil wholesale prices to their US counter parts. How does the economics work for CDN companies with such a low price??
Thank you

Q: Hi Peter and Team,

This is a follow up on your answer to Gervais re: PM and MO. I was just wondering if you can comment on the huge difference in P/E between the two companies. PM is trading at 25.7X while MO's ratio is 8X. Wouldn't MO be a better buy at such a low PE ratio even though about a quarter of its business is in the US?
Great work guys, as usual.

Q: This company has an interesting (Beatons Creek, and Marble Bar) property in Australia. Sounds like huge potential given similar geology to gold regions in South Africa. What are your thoughts on this company.

Q: Recently I have made a nice profit on Ballard Power Systems. Do you think the price will rise more in the meantime ? Long term I like it.

Q: If you had two or three hundred thousand dollars (not in an RRSP or TFSA), and you wanted to grow it aggressively for a period of about three to five years, how would you invest it, and what kind of a return would you expect? Would your answer be different if it was only fifty thousand? Assume that I don't need any income from the investment, that I have maximal tolerance for risk, and that I've already tried tulips but I was 380 years too late. Thanks.

Q: Hi 5i! This is regarding Altagas (ALA); please correct me if I am mistaken in setting this out:
1. The prospect of the return of cost of the receipts in the event the WGL takeover collapses: Doesn't this really mean that receipt-holders would receive $31 minus the total of all dividend equivalent payments issued in respect of each receipt held (even if they were issued to someone else before you bought your receipts)? In that case, if the deal were to collapse after 15 monthly distributions, receipt holders would be due to receive $31 - $2.625 (i.e. minus 15 x $0.175) or net $28.375 per subscription receipt? In this situation, people holding the receipts from issue in taxable accounts would still be down the tax on the distributions, even after receiving 'reimbursement' for the cost of the receipts.

2. Do you know if ALA's management or board have given any indication of their intentions about the possibility of a dividend increase in 2017 or even any time before the closing date of the WGL transaction? Previously ALA had been raising annually. I have seen people writing as though dividend increases are off the table until Sept 2018 but I don't remember seeing an announcement from the company to that effect.

3. If Altagas' share price is down because "the market does not like the WGL transaction" or because "the market does not like uncertainty," wouldn't that suggest that if the deal falls through the share price would be likely to rise, particularly given any continuation of the recent strong quarterly report? I believe it was trading in the range of $33-35 shortly before the WGL deal was announced.
Thanks!

Q: Are covered call ETF's okay to put in a non registered account vs TFSA & RRSP from a tax perspective vs regular dividend etfs? Does this make things more complicated when filing?
Also what is the opinion of 5i regarding PDF?

Thank you!

Q: I would like to deploy cash held in my Canadian $ brokerage account on the basis that the Canadian dollar will decline in value in relation to the US dollar. I am considering the purchase of ZTS BMO Short Term US Treasury Bond Index. My premise is that this ETF should be very stable in the value of its holdings but will directly reflect changes in the CDN/US $ ratio. Is this correct?

Other than paying the high bank exchange spread or deploying a Norbert’s Gambit transaction, is there a better way to institute this idea? Is ZTS a suitable ETF for this purpose?
Thanks
David

Q: Hi Team,
Would you see the STB is worth holding and dividend cut coming ?
Thanks as always.
Tak

Q: Hi,

What are your thoughts about Open Text's growth prospects in the next year or two?

If the growth is anticipated to be low and the return is going to be just the dividend, maybe I should look elsewhere.

Are there better growth/income options in the tech sector?

Thanks,

Gord

Q: Could you update on Novagold, Cash position and management?

Q: Is this a good entry point for Inter Pipeline? Tx

Q: Are utilities just not the place to be right now?

Q: I am retired, age 65 and I am constructing a portfolio for dividend income which my aim is to have monthly dividend income for cycles 1,2 and 3 for dividend payments. This will be my main portfolio for income.Here is the portfolio I have put together for a unregistered account :
cycle 1: BNS,BCE,SU,TD,GSY,TRP,T
cycle 2: BMO,EMA,RY
cycle 3: FTS,ENB,MFC,SLF,TRI,SLF,NFI,CU-T,AQN,ATD.B,CCL.B
I would appreciate your opinion on this portfolio.Also, I'm sitting in cash in my TFSA and I am looking to possibly put some of these stocks in that account and would appreciate your recommendation on that as well.

Q: For year end tax reasons, is there another oil company that you would suggest to replace Crew Energy with?

Thankyou

Q: I am a fan of covered calls. I am retired and like the income, tax treatment and downside protection. In addition I like the diversity an ETF brings.
I hold all the above but am looking for more diversity. Are there equivalent US offerings? Does BMO have competing products that are more diverse?
Thanks

Q: Hi Peter: Is Peyto exploration's dividend sustainable given the world wide oversupply of natural gas and Peyto not holding any cash? is this (not having cash) normal for these types of companies?