high quality stocks

ISHARES MSCI BRAZIL INDEX FUND $42.51 (New York Exchange symbol EWZ; buy or sell through brokers) is an exchange traded fund that is designed to track the Brazilian stock market.

Top holdings are Petrobras (oil and gas), 10.7%; Vale do Rio Doce (mining), 9.1%; Cia Itau Unibanco Holding (banking), 7.4%; Cia de Bebidas das Americas (beer and beverages), 6.9%; Banco Brandesco, 5.5%; and BRF SA (food), 3.5%.

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We think conservative investors could hold up to 10% of their portfolios in foreign stocks. One way to do that is to buy carefully chosen exchange traded funds (ETFs) that have an overseas focus....

We think conservative investors could hold up to 10% of their portfolios in foreign stocks. One way to do that is to buy carefully chosen exchange traded funds (ETFs) that have an overseas focus.

The best ETFs offer very low management fees and well-diversified, tax-efficient portfolios of highquality stocks.

Here are six international ETFs we like:

ISHARES MSCI JAPAN INDEX FUND $12.04 (New York Exchange symbol EWJ; buy or sell through brokers; us.ishares.com) is an exchange traded fund that tries to match the return of the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Japan index.

The ETF’s top holdings include Toyota, 6.1%; Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, 3.1%; Softbank Corp., 3.0%; Honda Motor, 2.5%; Sumitomo Mitsui Financial, 2.4%; Mizuho Financial Group, 1.8%; Hitachi, 1.4%; Takeda Pharmaceutical, 1.3%; Canon, 1.3%; and Mitsubishi Estate Co., 1.3%.

The fund’s industry breakdown is as follows: Financials, 21.5%; Consumer Discretionary, 20.9%; Industrials, 19.3%; Information Technology, 10.4%; Consumer Staples, 6.3%; Health Care, 6.0%; Materials, 5.9%; Telecommunication Services, 5.8%; Utilities, 2.5%; and Energy, 1.2%.

iShares MSCI Japan Index Fund was launched on March 12, 1996....

At first glance, managing an investment portfolio may resemble prize fighting, with an investor bobbing and weaving to get the upper hand on the market. But for successful investors, good portfolio management is much more like a multi-dimensional tightrope act. And you must be able to perform these 4 balancing acts to succeed.

Here’s the text of the quarterly letter I recently sent to our Portfolio Management clients: “In my last couple of quarterly letters, I talked about my belief that we’re in a secular bull market. This is a long-term stock-market rise that carries the market to successively higher levels over a period of a decade or two, if not longer. Secular bull markets generally start after a period of financial distress, when many investors feel at least somewhat negative toward the stock market. This period of financial distress may have lasted up to a decade, or longer. It’s a time when corporate earnings are weak or irregular, and investors assume they will stay that way indefinitely. Investor sentiment becomes extremely negative, and investors take it for granted that the market may be headed for another big downturn. The secular bull market begins around the time when investors begin to swing back to a more positive view of the stock market....

More and more, I find that I cringe a little every time an investor tells me that they recognize their current investment approach is not appropriate, but they are not yet ready to switch. With a little probing, these investors usually go on to explain that they have lost too much money with the current approach, and they “can’t afford” to sell out at current prices and convert that paper loss into a real one. Instead, they plan to stick with the current approach for an indefinite period. Sometimes they want to hold on to their current portfolio until they get back to break-even. Others say they’ll be satisfied if the current loss shrinks by, say, half. I recall one time in summer 2000. A friend asked me to have a short chat with a female relative who had just gone through a divorce and had received “a very generous settlement”. He said he didn’t know the details but the lady wanted an outside opinion on what to do with her money....

ISHARES MSCI BRAZIL INDEX FUND $48.89 (New York Exchange symbol EWZ; buy or sell through brokers) is an exchange traded fund that is designed to track the Brazilian stock market.

Top holdings are Petrobras (oil and gas), 11.8%; Vale do Rio Doce (mining), 9.6%; Cia Itau Unibanco Holding (banking), 7.5%; Banco Brandesco preferred, 6.1%; Cia de Bebidas das Americas (beer and beverages), 5.7%; and BRF SA (food), 4.0%.

The ETF was launched on July 10, 2000. It has an expense ratio of 0.62%.
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We think conservative investors could hold up to 10% of their portfolios in foreign stocks. One way to do that is to buy carefully chosen exchange traded funds (ETFs) that have an overseas focus.

The best ETFs offer very low management fees and well-diversified, tax-efficient portfolios of highquality stocks.

Here are six international ETFs we like:

ISHARES MSCI JAPAN INDEX FUND $11.81 (New York Exchange symbol EWJ; buy or sell through brokers; us.ishares.com) is an exchange traded fund that tries to match the return of the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Japan index.

The ETF’s top holdings include Toyota, 6.6%; Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, 3.1%; Sumitomo Mitsui Financial, 2.4%; Softbank Corp., 2.4%; Honda Motor, 2.3%; Mizuho Financial Group, 1.9%; Japan Tobacco, 1.5%; Takeda Pharmaceutical, 1.4%; Canon, 1.3%; and Hitachi, 1.2%.

The fund’s industry breakdown is as follows: Financials, 21.4%; Consumer Discretionary, 21.1%; Industrials, 19.6%; Information Technology, 9.6%; Consumer Staples, 6.3%; Materials, 6.2%; Health Care, 5.9%; Telecommunication Services, 5.1%; Utilities, 2.8%; and Energy, 1.2%.

iShares MSCI Japan Index Fund was launched on March 12, 1996....

investing for beginners advice- Whether you’re a beginning or experienced investor, these weekly updates are designed to give you specific investment tips

High-quality stocks like Great-West and IGM are a great way to diversify your Finance sector holdings beyond Canada’s big five banks. If you can accept the added risk, we also like Home Capital Group (see box).

GREAT-WEST LIFECO INC. $31 (Toronto symbol GWO; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 951.4 million; Market cap: $29.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.0; Dividend Yield: 4.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.greatwestlifeco.com) is Canada’s second-largest insurance company after Manulife, with $581.9 billion of assets under administration....