Income Trust Update

Article Excerpt

Our standing advice on income trusts is to limit them to one-sixth of your portfolio or less. In addition, we mainly recommend trusts that come out of trust conversions aimed at improving shareholder value. We stay out of most new issues, trusts included. In our view, all too many new trust issues were callous attempts at cashing in on investor demand for anything with a high yield. These simple restrictions limited our readers’losses when the new trust rules came out. We think the damage is done, so we recommend the same trusts as before. Note that two of our trust buys are exempt as REITs from the new tax rules. Another of our trust recommendations, VERSACOLD INCOME FUND $8.36 (Toronto symbol ICE.UN; Aggressive Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; SI Rating: Extra risk), might qualify as a REIT if it sells its foreign assets. Versacold is a buy. My Global portfolio Last week we sent out a special email to announce an interview I did with Global…