Comments on: Costs of the Sleepy Portfolio

By: Are you trading too much? | Canadian Capitalist

Are you trading too much? | Canadian Capitalist — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 05:34:04 +0000

[...] the Sleepy Portfolio, for instance. It costs an investor about 20 basis points in fees charged by the portfolio components. Trading costs are extra. The portfolio saw just one [...]

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 19:14:17 +0000

Phil - A bond ETF is equivalent to a bond ladder. If your investment horizon is longer than the fund's duration, then your principal is pretty safe.

By: Sleepy Portfolio: Low-Cost, Low-Maintenance, Tax-Efficient, ETF Portfolio | Canadian Capitalist

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:18:29 +0000

[...] The blended cost of the Sleepy Portfolio is just 0.22%! [...]

By: Traciatim

Traciatim — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 23:23:47 +0000

Remus, yes every order to buy or sell each stock is considered one transaction.

By: Remus

Remus — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 19:17:06 +0000

Guys sorry for this naive question but can you please tell me: each time you do a transaction via a broker it costs you 29$ in fees. What do they consider as 1 transaction?
If I buy 100 shares of company X and I buy 200 shares of company Y those are 2 transactions meaning 2×29$ or is considered as 1 transaction?
As I suspect the answer is 2 transaction… but let me ask anyway. The buy and sell are also 2 transactions? So using the above example to buy 100 shares of company X and sell 200 shares of company Y?

thanks

By: Phil S

Phil S — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 15:25:33 +0000

Dave, let’s discuss this issue in the future after CC gets his post together about fixed income exposure.

By: Canadian Capitalist

Canadian Capitalist — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 22:10:16 +0000

Joe: Good question. I didn’t know of AIS100 when I started the Sleepy Portfolio.

Anon: You cannot purchase Vanguard ETFs in CDN dollars. Therefore, when you first buy the ETF, your CDN dollars will be first converted to USD usually for about a 1% fee. You can check on many discussions on currency effects in the archives. Just search for “currency”.

By: Anonette Anon

Anonette Anon — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 17:57:03 +0000

Sorry newbie Question…
Can Canadians purchase Vanguard ETFs in CDN dollars? Or is there a currency exchange which must take place within a Canadian Discount Brokerage? Thanks in advance…

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 16:49:22 +0000

“The reason why people buy bonds is to preserve their original capital and holding individual bonds will do just that… But bond funds have no maturity date and are marked to market daily, so in a rising interest rate market, you will lose money and hence it won’t preserve your capital.”

So if we pretend the fund is like a person and it is holding individual bonds they will preserve their original capital just as you said. But you’re saying that all the shareholders of that fund will lose money. Seems like you’re violating conservation of money here.

By: Canadian Capitalist

Canadian Capitalist — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 14:22:06 +0000

Phil: I am planning a future post on how to get fixed income exposure – bond ladders or funds or GICs. It is true that bond funds fluctuate in value but unless you need money maturing at a certain point in the future, bond funds are an acceptable alternative to owning bonds directly in long-term portfolios.

You are right about XRE, of course. I think it is better to just buy REI.UN and HR.UN directly as a proxy for XRE.