Bonds Behaving Badly
There are a couple of basic rules bond investors can depend on. The first is that bond prices fall when interest rates rise, and vice-versa. The second is that long-term bonds are vulnerable to larger [...]
Ask Me Anything: Part 2
Here’s Part 2 of the highlights from my recent AMA on Reddit. This is a lightly edited transcript of the exchange, along with some additional comments and links I didn’t have time to provide during th [...]
Podcast 16: Common Sense With Ben Carlson
In Episode 16 of the Canadian Couch Potato podcast, I’m joined by Ben Carlson, the author of A Wealth of Common Sense and creator of the excellent blog of the same name. Ben is also Director of Instit [...]
Podcast 15: The Value of Simple
The latest episode of the Canadian Couch Potato podcast focuses on the relationship between cost and complexity in your investment plan. You can often lower fees in your portfolio with a few simple ch [...]
Vanguard’s One-Fund Solution
It was one of the great mysteries in the Canadian fund market: why had no one created an ETF version of the balanced index mutual fund? These days you can find ETFs focusing on just about every sub-se [...]
Couch Potato Portfolio Returns for 2017
They contained no marijuana stocks and no bitcoin, but the Couch Potato portfolios put up another good year in 2017. Once again, investors were rewarded for simply following a disciplined, low cost, b [...]
RBC Revamps Its Index Fund Lineup
In my last post, I reviewed RBC’s forthcoming lineup of traditional ETFs, which will appear later this summer. The launch of these ETFs will also spark some changes in RBC’s index mutual funds: they’l [...]
How TD Put the “Managed” in ETF Portfolios
What Canadian bank was first to launch a line of ETFs? You might think it was BMO, which is by far the biggest bank in the industry today, with more than 70 ETFs and some $37 billion in assets. But in [...]
Podcast 5: Master Class with the Millionaire Teacher
My newest podcast features an interview with Andrew Hallam, author of Millionaire Teacher, a compelling introduction to building wealth through smart saving and disciplined investing. Andrew grew up i [...]
Couch Potato Portfolio Returns for 2016
If you believe the media, 2016 was an annus horribilis: some even dubbed it the worst year ever. I think there were a few years during the Great Depression or World War II that might have been worse, [...]
