Vanguard’s VXC Gets a Facelift
The Vanguard FTSE All-World ex Canada (VXC) allows Canadians to get access to US, international and emerging markets equities with a single ETF, and it’s one of the ingredients in my model portfolios. [...]
How Bad Data Leads to Poor Investment Decisions
Making smart investment decisions is difficult enough when you have reliable information. If you're working with inaccurate or misleading data, good decisions become almost impossible. The most popula [...]
How Changing Interest Rates Affect Fixed Income
It’s been a tough few months for bonds. Since early February, the yield on Government of Canada five-year bonds has climbed from 0.59% to about 1.07%, and 10-year bonds yielding 1.24% have ticked up t [...]
Bias toward Canadian stocks is just fine
There are several good reasons to overweight Canadian equities in your portfolio {MoneySense]
Should You Replace Bonds With Cash?
Not many investors are enthusiastic about bonds these days, and it’s hard to blame them. While rates have ticked up in the last few weeks, they’re still so low that even some sophisticated investors h [...]
How Budget 2015 Will Affect Investors
Yesterday’s federal budget included several changes that will affect investors—in the future if not immediately. Let’s look at the three most important announcements, with a focus on how they may appl [...]
Ask the Spud: Do Aggressive Portfolios Pay Off?
Q: I noticed that over the long term (10 to 20 years) the average returns of your model portfolios are quite similar regardless of the asset allocation, but the maximum losses vary dramatically. Would [...]
Announcing the Couch Potato Robo-Advisor Service
[Note: This was an April Fool's joke!] One of the most exciting developments in investing is the rise of online wealth managers, also known as robo-advisors. These services offer online portfolio mana [...]
Ask the Spud: GICs vs. Bond Funds
Q: I would appreciate it if you could write an article contrasting the advantages and disadvantages of holding bond funds versus GICs. – A.R. All of my model Couch Potato portfolios include bond funds [...]
Are Preferred Share Indexers Dumb Money?
It’s hard to keep a straight face while arguing for active strategies in asset classes like large-cap stocks or government bonds. Those markets are so liquid and so well covered by analysts that it’s [...]
