Exchange traded funds trade on stock exchanges, just like stocks. Investors can buy them on margin, or sell them short. The best exchange-traded funds offer well-diversified, tax-efficient portfolios with exceptionally low management ETF fees. They are also very liquid.
Investors use ETFs in a variety of ways, and some investors work only with ETFs and no other type of investment in portfolio creation.
An amazing aspect of ETFs is their diversity. Some investors may create an entire portfolio solely from a few well-diversified ETFs.
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.
As well, shares are only added or removed when the underlying index changes. As a result of this low turnover, you won’t incur the regular capital gains taxes generated by the yearly distributions most conventional mutual funds pay out to unitholders.
ETFs have a place in every investor’s portfolio, at TSI Network we also recommend using our three-part Successful Investor strategy:
- Invest mainly in well-established companies;
- Spread your money out across most if not all of the five main economic sectors (Manufacturing & Industry; Resources & Commodities; the Consumer sector; Finance; Utilities);
- Downplay or avoid stocks in the broker/media limelight.
[text_ad]
The fund started up in January 2011. Its MER is a relatively high 0.71%.
BMO Canadian High Dividend Covered Call ETF yields a high 6.0%. However, the dividend income that the fund receives from its own portfolio is insufficient to cover the distribution to its unitholders. To make up the difference, it has to make a profit on trading its portfolio. The ETF also aims to raise its returns by writing call options on the portfolio’s securities.
Here are two ETF buys. Each offers you to a portfolio of stocks selected for their low valuations. (See also the Supplement on page 99).
The ETF’s top holdings are Canadian Apartment REIT (13.5%), RioCan REIT (10.9%), Granite REIT (9.5%), First Capital Reality REIT (8.2%), Choice Properties REIT (8.0%), Dream Industrial (6.9%), SmartCentres REIT (6.9%), H&R REIT (6.3%), Boardwalk REIT (5.6%) and Allied Properties REIT (4.8%).
Its top holdings are First Solar (China; solar panels), 9.3%; NEXTracker Inc. (U.S. solar trackers), 9.3%; GCL Technology (China; polysilicon), 7.5%; Enphase Energy (U.S.; home solar systems), 6.9%; Sunrun (U.S.; panels), 6.5%; and Xinyi Solar (China; solar panels), 5.0%. The ETF’s MER is a relatively high 0.67%.
The long-term outlook for renewables remains positive as governments and corporations move steadily away from fossil fuels.
Vanguard is one of the world’s largest investment management companies. In all, it administers over $10 trillion U.S., spread across 441 mutual funds and ETFs. Here are two of its ETFs that we see as buys for you right now.
The MER (Management Expense Ratio) is generally much lower on traditional ETFs than on conventional mutual funds. That’s because most traditional ETFs take a much simpler approach to investing. Instead of actively managing clients’ investments, ETF providers invest so as to mirror the holdings and performance of a particular stock-market index.
Here we consider the risks and rewards of some of the main strategies employed by ETF managers to generate income for their funds.
For the month of July, there were advances from the top global technology companies (as illustrated by Toronto symbol TEC), uranium producers (Toronto symbol HURA), U.S. utilities (New York symbol VPU), and U.S. biotech companies (New York symbol IBB).