Canadian Capitalist

In a long-running rebate on the merits of Group RESP plans, a remark by a commenter touched a nerve:
To work with mutual funds or stocks, parents need to know what they are doing. This takes a lot of time and planning. I am too busy for that.
As you can imagine, I am not very sympathetic [...]

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In response to a long-running debate on the merits of the Smith Manoeuvre, a financial planner made the following comment:
The best portfolio is a diversified portfolio, MER be damned.
The MER (or management expense ratio) refers to the management fees, trailer fees paid to your investment advisors, administration charges and GST. MER is reported as a [...]

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The Bank of Canada decided to keep interest rates steady and the prime rate charged by the major banks stays at 6%. The statement seems to indicate that the Bank will maintain the current interest rate in its next meeting.
The federal government has enacted a legislation that drops the minimum down payment required to get [...]

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Here are some of the new entrants in the Canadian Personal Finance blogosphere:
A Canadian and Her Money is written by Money Diva, a 32-year old consultant who has amassed a significant nest egg for someone her age. She updates us on her net worth, discusses what she does to grow it, her long-term plans etc. [...]

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Stocks listed in emerging markets such as South Korea, South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, Russia, India and China have a place in your portfolio because of their higher risk / reward profile and lower correlations to developed markets equities (though markets are becoming more correlated). The MSCI Emerging Markets index tracks the performance of equities listed [...]

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Our son is sick today; so I won’t be posting today and possibly tomorrow.

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We purchase our home, auto and life insurance policies from the same agent and we have been clients for about eight years now. Over the years, I’ve obtained quotes from the competition a few times and found that our agent’s rates are always within a $100 of the best available rate. This year the renewal [...]

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Jonathan Chevreau asks if the acquisition of Algoma Steel by an Indian company means that Canadians should get a little more exposure to the Indian market.
Larry MacDonald points out that as the GST rebate for purchasing a brand new house is not indexed for inflation, fewer and fewer houses now qualify for the full rebate.
Rob [...]

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The MSCI EAFE index tracks equities in developed economies of Europe, Australia and the Far East (hence the EAFE acronym) and is the simplest way for Canadians to get exposure to markets in Japan, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Switzerland and Australia etc.
Two ETFs, both from iShares, are available to capture the performance of the index: [...]

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Canadians wanting to get exposure to the US stock market through an ETF have a range of options. They could choose to invest in the well-known S&P 500 index, which is composed of 500 of the largest-capitalization stocks listed in the US. A better option is to track a total market index, which includes almost [...]

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