Looking for investing ideas? Here’s your weekly digest of the Globe’s latest insights and analysis from the pros, stock tips, portfolio strategies plus what investors need to know for the week ahead.
Three stock picks for the post-pandemic recovery from $220-million fund manager Jennifer Radman
Portfolio manager Jennifer Radman, who oversees about $220-million across three funds for Caldwell Investment Management, felt the market start to shift at the end of the second quarter, when many technology stocks stalled, Brenda Bouw writes. At the same time, she says investors saw the “worst case” for cyclical stocks. It was also around that time that her team started to pick up a few beaten-down cyclical names in sectors such as steel, auto production, forestry and agriculture. Here she discusses three picks from her U.S. and Canadian funds: L3Harris Technologies, Interfor and Visa.
Have markets priced in all the good vaccine news? Not when it comes to these stocks
Bold investors may want to go bargain hunting in areas left behind in this vaccine-driven market rally, Ian McGugan writes. While several broad benchmarks of stock prices have jumped in recent weeks because following good news from medical trials, many individual sectors and companies are still trading well below their prepandemic levels. Consider airline stocks, which languish well below their January highs. Or look at real estate investment trusts (REITs), especially those that specialize in office and retail properties.
The U.S. Global Jets ETF, which tracks a basket of major U.S. airlines, has been surging on the vaccine news but is still more than 25 per cent below its prepandemic levels. In Canada, the Vanguard FTSE Canadian Capped REIT Index ETF, which holds a diversified basket of REITs, is trading 10 per cent below its level in January. The caveat: Anyone tempted to go this route should come equipped with patience and a tolerance for volatility. Read more here.
More trom Ian McGugan: Tesla zooms past Warren Buffett’s vast empire in market value, putting investors in a precarious position
Money is pouring into bond ETFs despite painfully low interest rates – here’s why
It’s a testament to the usefulness of bond ETFs that they’re selling briskly in a year when the outlook for fixed income has rarely looked less appealing, Rob Carrick writes. Introduced to the world 20 years ago right here in Canada, bond ETFs simplified life for investors who want to build their own diversified portfolios. They provide cheap, transparent, liquid and infinitely adaptable access to bonds, which otherwise must be purchased through investment dealers who have an excessive amount of power to dictate prices to clients. If your portfolio needs bonds, then you have to at least consider bond ETFs. Even in a low-rate world, these funds can be shaped to suit almost any investor’s needs. Read more here.
| Fund | Ticker | Assets under mgt.($ mil.) | MER (%) | Yield to maturity (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BMO Aggregate Bond Index ETF | ZAG-T | 5,503 | 0.08 | 1.25 |
| iShares Core Canadian Universe Bond Index ETF | XBB-T | 4,371 | 0.10 | 1.29 |
| Vanguard Canadian Aggregate Bond Index ETF | VAB-T | 3,100 | 0.09 | 1.30 |
| iShares Core Canadian Short Term Bond Index ETF | XSB-T | 2,520 | 0.10 | 0.61 |
| BMO Long Federal Bond Index ETF | ZFL-T | 2,279 | 0.22 | 1.08 |
| Horizons Cdn. Select Universe Bond ETF | HBB-T | 1,965 | 0.10 | 1.06 |
| iShares Canadian Corporate Bond Index ETF | XCB-T | 1,615 | 0.44 | 1.84 |
| Vanguard Canadian Short-Term Bond Index ETF | VSB-T | 1,200 | 0.11 | 0.60 |
| BMO Core Plus Bond Fund ETF | ZCPB-T | 1,135 | 0.56 | 1.47 |
| BMO Mid Corporate Bond Index ETF | ZCM-T | 1,048 | 0.33 | 2.02 |
Source: National Bank Financial