Cutting Through the Noise
March 18, 2010
It’s always great to visit Montreal, but last Thursday was particularly timely for reasons beyond the sunny, warm weather. It is the home turf for Wil Wutherich, the manager of our Small-Cap Fund, a fund that has just turned three years old (along with the rest...
Read MoreMarch 15, 2010
David and I met last week with Ian Cormack and Cathy Alsop from Edinburgh Partners (EPL) in Toronto. EPL manages the Steadyhand Global Equity Fund. The meeting reinforced the depth and experience of the firm (they announced two senior additions...
Read MoreMarch 10, 2010
March 8, 2010
With very few exceptions, the investment managers who did poorly when markets were melting down bounced back with a solid return last year. What didn't work in 2008 worked well in 2009. That wasn't the case, however, for one of Canada's highest...
Read MoreMarch 2, 2010
I admit to doing less reading over the last few weeks (which is criminal for an investment professional) due to a minor sporting event being held in Vancouver. But between the spectating, TV viewing and partying, I did manage to catch up on some...
Read MoreFebruary 25, 2010
By far the most popular topic in the business press these days is ETFs (exchange-traded funds). Not a day goes by without an article on them (and yes, I am planning to write one in the near future). In all of the commentaries, trading flexibility is put...
Read MoreFebruary 24, 2010
The notion of “active share” is in the news again. Coined by a pair of Yale professors in 2007, active share is a measure that indicates just how actively managed a fund really is. In other words, it is a gauge of how much a fund looks like, or overlaps, a certain...
Read MoreFebruary 22, 2010
Located in Vancouver and being the sports (analogy) junkies that we are, readers would expect us to go crazy with Olympic stuff. Certainly there are obvious connections between Olympics and investing - the value of time; the notion of risk and reward (the topic of...
Read MoreFebruary 20, 2010
Watching the Olympics, the notion of risk is very clear. Athletes need to push it to the limit in order to get to that top spot on the podium. But to obtain the advantage, they risk missing a gate, catching an edge or taking an untimely penalty. They may...
Read MoreFebruary 16, 2010
It’s Day 5 of the Games. As we’re lucky enough to be in the heart of the action here in Vancouver (or unlucky enough depending on your viewpoint), it’s time for a few observations: Canadians are bursting with pride and patriotism. Which is a good thing, no matter how you look at it. There have been a few early disappointments for the home team (Manny Osborne-Paradis...
Read MoreFebruary 10, 2010
Seth Godin is a renowned author, marketer and blogger. He has great insights and observations on human behavior and the business world. In a recent blog, Hunters and Farmers, he examines the differences between the two types of individuals. In Seth's...
Read MoreFebruary 8, 2010
Tom was on BNN this morning (Feb 8) with Marty Cej and Frances Horodelski. Topics of discussion included: What to do at this stage in the market; How to reflect caution in your portfolio; and ETFs. The seven minute piece brings together some key messages from Tom’s...
Read MoreFebruary 8, 2010
Call it an interesting juxtaposition. A few pages after my column on reaching for yield a couple of weeks back, there was a back page ad for the MINT Income Fund. Since then, the ad has been running constantly in the national papers. MINT, which is an existing closed...
Read MoreFebruary 6, 2010
A consequence of being a non-benchmark manager and running a transparent shop is that we are asked direct and incisive questions. At a presentation last week, a client asked what criteria I would use for changing a manager on one of our funds...
Read MoreFebruary 4, 2010
February 3, 2010
Don Cranston, one of the founding partners of CGOV Asset Management (the manager of our Equity Fund) was in town last week enjoying some of our rain. We put Don in front of the microphone and asked him a few of the questions that are at the top of investors’ minds these days: How and why does CGOV incorporate foreign holdings into the fund? What were some of the...
Read MoreFebruary 1, 2010
"The lower-hanging fruit is largely gone...but the return profiles are still attractive, relative to the extremely low cost of funding." This innocuous quote from Peter Schoenfeld is very telling. In an article about the outlook for hedge fund strategies in 2010 in Barron’s...
Read MoreJanuary 28, 2010
If you’re an income investor, T-Bills and GICs aren’t helping you much these days. And the prospects for government bonds are nothing to get excited about. In order to achieve a more desirable return, you may find yourself reaching for yield, or moving up the...
Read MoreJanuary 26, 2010
The discipline of writing 800-900 words for the Globe and Mail every two weeks means that stuff gets left on the cutting room floor. But as I’m learning, that’s usually where it belongs. Having said that, I did want to add an addendum to my last installment...
Read MoreJanuary 23, 2010
There's no question about it. The defining feature of the capital markets right now is the search for more yield. Individuals are doing it. Institutions are doing it. And new product development is totally focused on it. I get an e-mail almost every day announcing a...
Read MoreJanuary 21, 2010
Morningstar’s Manager of Fund Analysis, David O’Leary, recently published an article titled Six Changes We Would Like to See in the Canadian Mutual Fund Industry. O’Leary acknowledges that by and large, Canada has an investor-friendly fund industry. Yet...
Read MoreJanuary 9, 2010
A lot is written about how to pick a money manager, but it's also important to know how to be a good client. A manager-client relationship should last a long time and be rooted in confidence, empathy and stability. Both sides are working toward a common...
Read MoreJanuary 7, 2010
Mercer, the pension and benefits consultant, reported this week that the funding status of Canadian pension plans improved dramatically in 2009. Its ‘pension health index’ moved up from 59 to 74, meaning that for a typical plan, 74% of the pension liabilities...
Read MoreJanuary 6, 2010
There is an interesting business case playing out in the U.S. right now with Kraft Foods attempting to takeover Cadbury. The saga started 4 months ago when Kraft made a hostile bid. Cadbury’s board rejected the cash and shares offer, but by then the...
Read MoreDecember 29, 2009
I love reading sports statistics and box scores (the Suns beat the Lakers last night and Nash had 16 points, 13 assists and was 5 for 11 from the field), but I’ve never been much for economic data. Yesterday on the plane, however, I was scanning the economic...
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