top stocks

ISHARES S&P/TSX 60 INDEX FUND $21.54 (Toronto symbol XIU; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) is a good low-fee way to buy the top stocks on the TSX. The units are made up of stocks that represent the S&P/TSX 60 Index, which consists of the 60 largest, most heavily traded stocks on the exchange....

Exchange traded funds (ETFs) are set up to mirror the performance of a stock market index or sub-index. They hold a more or less fixed selection of securities that represent the holdings that go into the calculation of the index or sub-index. ETFs trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks. That’s different from mutual funds, which you can only buy at the end of the day, at a price that reflects the fund’s value at the close of trading. Prices of ETFs are quoted in newspaper stock tables and online. You pay brokerage commissions to buy and sell them, but their low management fees give them a cost advantage over most mutual funds....

Every Thursday we bring you “Our Top U.S. Stocks” as our daily post. In these new posts, you’ll get our specific recommendation on the stocks we profile, with a full explanation of how we arrived at our opinion. You will read about stocks making moves you should know about covered in our newsletter on U.S. investing, Wall Street Stock Forecaster. “Our Top U.S. Stocks” is part of our new approach offering you regular buy, hold and sell advice in our daily posts. Every week you get “A Stock to Sell” on Monday, “Best Canadian Stocks” on Tuesday and on Friday, our advice on one of the stocks our Inner Circle members have asked about in their weekly Question & Answer sessions FEDEX CORP. (New York symbol FDX; www.fedex.com) delivers packages and documents in the U.S. and over 220 other countries through its fleet of 650 planes and over 108,000 trucks and other surface vehicles....

ISHARES S&P/TSX 60 INDEX FUND $21.94 (Toronto symbol XIU; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) is a good low-fee way to buy the top stocks on the TSX. The units are made up of stocks that represent the S&P/TSX 60 Index, which consists of the 60 largest, most heavily traded stocks on the exchange. Expenses are just 0.17% of assets.

The index mostly consists of high-quality companies. However, it must ensure that all sectors are represented, so it holds a few we wouldn’t include.

The index’s top holdings are Royal Bank, 8.1%; TD Bank, 7.4%; Bank of Nova Scotia, 6.4%; Suncor Energy, 4.8%; CN Railway, 4.2%; Canadian Natural Resources, 3.9%; Bank of Montreal, 3.7%; Enbridge, 3.1%; Valeant Pharmaceuticals, 3.0%; Manulife Financial, 2.9%; CIBC, 2.8%; BCE, 2.7%; TransCanada Corp., 2.6%; Potash Corp., 2.5%; CP Rail, 2.2%; and Cenovus, 1.9%.

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Exchange traded funds (ETFs) are set up to mirror the performance of a stock market index or sub-index. They hold a more or less fixed selection of securities that represent the holdings that go into the calculation of the index or sub-index. ETFs trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks. That’s different from mutual funds, which you can only buy at the end of the day, at a price that reflects the fund’s value at the close of trading. Prices of ETFs are quoted in newspaper stock tables and online. You pay brokerage commissions to buy and sell them, but their low management fees give them a cost advantage over most mutual funds....

iShares MSCI World Index Fund ETF, $34.01, symbol XWD on Toronto (Units outstanding: 5.8 million; Market cap: $197.3 million; ca.ishares.com), holds large- and mid-cap stocks across 23 developed countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Japan, Singapore, the U.K. and the U.S. The ETF holds 1,507 stocks covering about 85% of the market in each nation. It does this by holding units of the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (54.3% of assets), the iShares MSCI EAFE ETF (41.6%) and the iShares MSCI Canada ETF (4.0%). iShares MSCI World Index Fund ETF has an MER of 0.47% and yields 1.6%....

Exchange traded funds (ETFs) are set up to mirror the performance of a stock-market index or sub-index. They hold a more or less fixed selection of securities that represent the holdings that go into the calculation of the index or sub-index.

ETFs trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks....

Pat McKeough responds to many requests from members of his Inner Circle for specific advice on the top stocks to buy as well as questions on investment strategy and the economy. Every week, his comments and recommendations on the most intriguing questions of the past week go out to all Inner Circle members. And each week, we offer you one of the highlights from these Q&A sessions. While we reserve our buy-hold-sell advice for Inner Circle members, these excerpts provide a great deal of information and analysis on stocks we’ve covered for members of Pat’s Inner Circle....

ISHARES S&P/TSX 60 INDEX FUND $19.25 (Toronto symbol XIU; buy or sell through brokers; ca.ishares.com) is a good low-fee way to buy the top stocks on the TSX. The units are made up of stocks that represent the S&P/TSX 60 Index, which consists of the 60 largest, most heavily traded stocks on the exchange. Expenses are just 0.17% of assets.

The index mostly consists of high-quality companies. However, it must ensure that all sectors are represented, so it holds a few we wouldn’t include.

The index’s top holdings are Royal Bank, 8.3%; TD Bank, 7.3%; Bank of Nova Scotia, 6.4%; Suncor Energy, 4.5%; CN Railway, 4.1%; Bank of Montreal, 3.9%; Manulife Financial, 3.1%; Canadian Natural Resources, 3.1%; CIBC, 3.0%; BCE, 3.0%; Enbridge, 3.0%; Valeant Pharmaceuticals, 2.9%; TransCanada Corporation, 2.7%; Potash Corp., 2.4%; CP Rail, 2.1%; Telus, 2.0%; and Cenovus, 1.9%.
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iShares Canadian Fundamental Index Fund ETF, $13.39, symbol CRQ on Toronto (Units outstanding: 16.8 million; Market cap: $225.0 million; ca.ishares.com), aims to track the FTSE RAFI Canada Index. The ETF’s top 10 holdings are Royal Bank, 7.2%; TD Bank, 6.2%; Bank of Nova Scotia, 5.0%; Manulife Financial, 4.6%; Suncor Energy, 4.4%; Bank of Montreal, 4.0%; Encana, 3.3%; CIBC, 3.0%; Canadian Natural Resources, 2.8%; and Sun Life Financial, 2.6%. Its expenses are 0.72% of its assets. The RAFI (Research Affiliates Fundamental Index) methodology aims to select companies by the highest fundamental measures of their size, rather than by market capitalization (or the value of all their outstanding shares)....