Canadian Couch Potato is your
complete guide to index investing
ETFs & Funds
The Promise of Fundamental Indexing
Last Friday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk by Rob Arnott, the creator of the Research ...
Couch Potatoes: Not the Next Financial Time Bomb
I would have been kicked out of journalism school for writing this: “The culprit behind the epidemic of ...
Not All Indexes Are Created Equal
The recently launched BMO Equal Weight REITs (ZRE), which invests in Canadian real estate investment trusts, will go head-to-head ...
Inside the iShares ESG Asset Allocation ETFs
Two of the biggest trends in investing these days are the popularity of one-fund portfolios and the focus ...
Vanguard Drops the Gloves
It’s not easy to make a splash in the crowded ETF space these days. Many of the new ...
Tim Pickering on Managed Futures, Part 1
On Monday I wrote about managed futures, a strategy that can add a layer of diversification to a ...
Indexing Basics
Couch Potato Portfolio Returns for 2013
Here are the 2013 performance figures for my Model Portfolios. Last year was one of stark contrasts: huge ...
Passive Investing: The Movie
There are countless books laying out the case for index investing, but as far as I know there ...
The Making of a Couch Potato
I know very few people who began their investing lives as Couch Potatoes. Most started out in mutual ...
Ask the Spud: Can You Time the Markets?
Q. Have you ever done any calculations into the optimal time to purchase index funds or ETFs based ...
Couch Potato Portfolio Returns for 2014
Here are the 2014 returns for my Model Portfolios. The data below are from the funds' websites whenever ...
Couch Potato Model Portfolios for 2015
Call off the hounds: I have finally updated my model Couch Potato portfolios for 2015. Full details appear ...
Financial Planning
Why Plans Should Come Before Products
When I wrote the MoneySense Guide to the Perfect Portfolio [now out of print], I waited until Chapter ...
A Monte Carlo Case Study: Can I Retire Early?
Last week’s post about Monte Carlo simulations in financial planning sparked some interesting comments, so I thought a ...
Ask the Spud: Is My Pension Like a Bond?
Q: My wife and I have been using the Couch Potato strategy for a few years now, but ...
What Is the Advisor’s Role?
John Lawrence Reynolds' newest book, The Skeptical Investor, argues that Canadians were badly served by their advisors during ...
It’s Time to Ban Advisor Commissions
Should financial advisors be banned from collecting commissions on mutual funds? That’s been hotly debated for years, and ...
Dividends: Not As Tax-Friendly As You May Think
If your investments include RRSPs, TFSAs and taxable accounts, asset location is an important consideration. The returns of ...
Behavioural Finance
Why RESPs Should Be Kept Simple
In the last couple of weeks I’ve received two questions from readers who were trying to figure out ...
Cost Versus Convenience in “ex Canada” ETFs
I used to own one of those one-piece cutlery tools designed for hiking and camping—the kind with a ...
Why Simple Is Still a Hard Sell
Last January, I overhauled my model portfolios to make them simpler. Some of the older options included small-cap ...
Podcast 20: One-Stop ETF Shopping
I’ve always tried to stress that successful investing is about the right process, not the right products. But ...
Should You Buy Stocks For Your Kids?
If you’re a parent, how can you set your child on the road to investing success? One popular ...
Podcast 25: Dr. Steve Wendel on Investor Success
The latest episode of the Canadian Couch Potato podcast features an interview with Dr. Stephen Wendel, Head of ...
Portfolio Management
How to Set Up a Hands-Off ETF Portfolio
For DIY investors, asset allocation ETFs may be the greatest gift to come along in decades. It’s never ...
It’s Time to Reboot Your Portfolio
It’s been a while since the last new article appeared on the Canadian Couch Potato blog, and over ...
A New Rebalancing Spreadsheet for ETFs
It’s easy enough to build an index fund portfolio with your desired mix of stocks and bonds. But ...
TD e-Series Returns for 2020
The TD e-Series index mutual funds remain a useful alternative to the asset allocation ETFs that take centre ...
Ask the Spud: Can I Make Taxable Investing Easier?
In Episode 4 of the Canadian Couch Potato podcast, I answered the following question from a listener named ...
Is VRIF Right for Your Portfolio?
In my last few posts, I introduced the newly launched Vanguard Retirement Income ETF Portfolio (VRIF), explained where ...
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