Canadian Capitalist

Prime Minister Stephen Harper wants Canadians to tell our respective MPs that we support the Tory plan to cut the GST rather than the income-tax cuts introduced by the previous government. Speaking in St. John’s yesterday (as reported in The National Post), Mr. Harper said:
To ensure that it [a 1% cut to the GST] becomes [...]

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The Federal Government is soliciting input from Canadians on various financial matters including what we would like to see in the upcoming and future budgets (Details on how to respond and the deadline can be found here). I intend to send the following comments:

Keep the income tax cuts: Personally, I prefer a cut in my [...]

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According to the Conference Board of Canada, after-tax income adjusted for inflation will rise by 5.4% in 2006, due to the cut in income taxes, an expected cut in the GST and wage inflation. The bad news is that the Bank of Canada is likely to keep increasing interest rates and we will be paying [...]

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Welcome to the 18th edition of the Festival of Frugality dedicated to posts that show how to make every dollar go a little bit further.
Without further ado, here are the highlights:
A Blast From the Past: Portion Control and Cost Per Serving: Frugal Wisdom shows how to practice the lost arts of portion control and [...]

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If there is an asset class that is now unloved, surely it has to be the large-cap U.S. blue chips like General Electric (GE), Johnson and Johnson (JNJ) and Wal-Mart (WMT). BusinessWeek magazine even did a cover story posing the question: “How long will the stocks of America’s largest companies remain weaklings on Wall Street?” [...]

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I considered VoIP for our home phone last year and decided against it, as it was not cheaper than a plain old telephone. I also had some doubts about the reliability of VoIP and what happens if I dialled 911. Our current no-frills local phone service from Bell Canada costs $22.13 per month and I [...]

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As I suspected, TD Waterhouse Canada is absorbing Ameritrade Canada accounts. I received the “Welcome Package” in the mail yesterday and instead of the $10.99 commissions for U.S. equities, I will start paying a minimum of $29 per trade. I only have two stocks in my Ameritrade account, so here are my options:

I can sell [...]

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I hate alternative investments, which is really a fancy term for over-priced financial products. The Globe and Mail is featuring a special report on such investments covering topics like iUnits ETFs, principal-protected notes, private equity, hedge funds, art and commodities. In my opinion, none of these products (apart from ETFs) are suitable for average investors. [...]

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The author, Fraser Smith, is a Vancouver-based financial planner, who devised the eponymous strategy to take advantage of the fact that while the interest paid on a mortgage for a personal residence is not tax-deductible, any interest on a loan taken out to make investments (in mutual funds or stocks or a private business) is [...]

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The Sleepy Portfolio, a well-diversified portfolio that I use as a benchmark had a stellar quarter in which it advanced 6.67%. All asset classes except bonds advanced and Canadian (XIC and XMD) and International equities (XIN and EEM) were once again big winners.
According to Microsoft Money, our personal portfolios lagged the benchmark returning 3.3% over [...]

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