Investment Ideas
 

The old family home is to be sold and it looks like I'll get about £30k of the proceeds. With no immediate use for the money (due to covid!) and bank interest rates being virtually zilch I would like to put it to work. I have set up an app called Freetrade and are ready to go, I am looking for growth rather than income and probably would leave the money invested for at least a year but there's just so much choice in terms of stocks and funds I honestly don't know where to start. Just wondering if there are any experienced investors out there in expats land who have any recommendations.

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Gozit Enterprises. ;)

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You could buy 0.74 of one Bitcoin. I wish I had bought more in 2016.

I should point out that the 2 coins I sold in 2016 for $800 would now be worth $140,000 if I'd grown a set of balls and held on to them.

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Ouch, I feel your pain, I first looked at bitcoin when they were about $400 and people were predicting $1000 and thought to myself it's just a passing fad! I heard someone say last year that bit coin could go to $1m which seemed crazy at the time but after the recent highs it would seem that $100k at least is not out of the question.

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Just send it to me and I promise I will invest it wisely. Send me your bank details in a private message and I'll take care of the rest. Just don't try and get hold of me too quickly or often.

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Are you by any chance a Nigerian Prince?

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Buy a classic car or bike. Or both.

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Vegas

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Just to piggyback off this thread, any recommended podcasts, apps or resources for people wanting to learn more about investing in Canada?

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Daaaaaam !

I've been a bitcoin sceptic from the start, but wish I had been a bit more of a risk taker. How much did you pay for the two coins you bought.

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I bought 2 coins at USD $232 each in Feb 2015 and held on to them until Dec 2016. I sold them for $450 each.

Could have been worse, but no where near as bad as this poor bloke.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/15/uk/bi...ntl/index.html

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I've heard about that guy, but hadn't read the details. Interesting. Talk about kicking yourself. The council is being unreasonable, it's likely that with some archeologists they could find the drive and the payout would be immense.

When you bought yours how does it work ... did you just buy them online with a credit/debit card?

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I guess my mindset is the way it is as I never had the money I could risk on investments, but looking back if I had a time machine, I have a few spots in life where I could have made a small fortune, but of course at the time the risk was high and not looking like it would have paid off. One such was when the airline I was working for stock went to like $2 a share, then a few years later with mergers those shares were bought for $45-$50 a share, had I taken all the money I had at the time and just bought said stock sat on it, I would have made enough to buy a house in San Diego at that time and still have some money left over.... Oh well it is what it is, I couldn't have afforded to lose that money, hence why I didn't invest it as the risk at the time was greater at losing than winning.

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What was the minimum you could have invested (assuming it was an employer distribution) ?

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I think it was $200 minimum. Keep in mind at the time $200 took me about 30 hours to earn gross and in an entire week I didn't even gross $300 unless I picked up over-time which wasn't available after 9/11, it was a time where you didn't know if you would have a job day to day or if the company would even be there the next day.

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You buy via an online exchange and send / receive bitcoin via a virtual wallet. Once you are setup, it's just like topping up an Amazon gift card and then using the gift card for purchases on Amazon.

I used this company https://www.coinbase.com/

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Thanks. Will have a look, though no current plans to "invest".

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Airlines are something to buy now.

No one will but those that do will win big.

I'm going for a couple of Electric vehicle plays.

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As successful investing is not a benefit of hindsight, if you don't know what you are doing, find someone who does.
1. What is your level of investment experience?
2. Can you afford to lose it all if the investment goes sideways?
3. GICs are more secure, but lower return.
4. Stocks and bonds are more volatile, best left to the recreational investor (who can take the hit) or the professional.
5. For smaller amounts, mutual funds and GICs, less risk, lower return, but better than a savings account.
6. On a lower risk investment these days 3 to 5% is likley the best right now. Although the past 12 months have seen even 12% surprisingly. Did not seem so optimistic a year ago though.
7. Significant gains have been made in the last 12 months, however can it hold and will it keep going up at the same rate?

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Since I asked the question and having bought a copy of the financial times! (lol) and I have split the money into 6 funds with Hargreaves Lansdown. Basically they are all either stock market or sector trackers so hopefully it's pretty well diversified against particular downturns. Pleasingly my more or less randomly chosen funds are up over 2%.

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Keep in mind that once you become resident for tax purposes in Canada you'll need to keep very careful track - deemed disposition / capital gains / costs / etc., so keep documenting! :)

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I think a few airline stocks we are now a bit too late to the Covid party on, I got in on Ryanair mid pandemic, (not lowest of the low) and got out mid November - stock prices are now at pre pandemic levels, wish I'd hung on, but thought it was a gift that could only carry on giving for so long.

Still in on BA but tempted to get out - got nothing in EV, but think there is some smart money to be made on the infrastructure for them and got a small fund there.




I know you've already bought funds from your last post, but going to put it here in case anyone else gets the same idea - as a semi experienced investor (been dabbling for maybe 5-6 years now) as a beginner avoid individual stocks like the plague unless you are treating it like a trip down the bookies (not that there's anything wrong with that, but probably not for any significant amounts of money). Number 1 point to a beginner investor who wants to go DIY would always be index funds/ETFs/mutual funds (I lean towards the first 2) once that's rolling feel free to have a play with small amounts of money on actual individual stocks, but choose ones that either interest you, or a section of the market to study and become accustomed too.

My last comment on this is don't get fixated on looking at your investments daily for anything passive - just sit back, check on it once a month, once a quarter ideally. if your in it for the semi long haul its value is irrelevant today, tomorrow or next week.

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good luck with your investments, once in a while please post back & update us.

@farmer on a bike post #19 good points to keep in mind.

investing in funds or the stock market ... there are no guarantees.

capital preservation is key, know your risk, dont lose any of it when someone suggest this, that & the other risky investments.

past performance is not indicative of future results.

.

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Seem to have made a good (lucky?) start. My portfolio has gone up by around 4.5% already which is about a thousand times the pittance my bank pays annually! Emboldened perhaps with my early success I am now looking at putting a little into bitcoin and to that end have just applied for a coinbase account and set up a digital wallet. As soon as my account is open I intend to sell my worse performing ETF and buy a bit of a bitcoin.

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Hope that goes well.

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I can't help thiinking that Bitcoin is past its biggest growth now... (it will obviously still grow, but not like it has been) usually when us mere mortals hear of big gains in an investment the party is already over. :getcoat:

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Yeah I feel I may be arriving late too. A few are predicting bit coin will go all the way to $1m which seems far fetched to me but quite a few are saying $150k is quite likely - which I'd take!

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Luckily the price doesn't go in a straight line up and to the right. Could easily go to 100k, 250k, 1 million but it could also go to 10k or 20k many times along the way.

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Today marks the first time that Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dogecoin hit all time highs on the same day!

If you had bought $1,000 of BTC this time a year ago, you’d have $9,100 by now.

$1,000 of ETH a year ago would be worth $14,000 today

But putting a $1,000 into Doge a year ago would now be worth $22,450 today!

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Yep. I had to do this with over 20 share options and 4 stock gifts from my last company. I had a huge spreadsheet detailing the US prices on specific dates, exchange rates on those dates and the gains when sold with the relative stock prices and exchange rates. Then use the formula from the CR to work out the gains.

I think the accountant just used my spreadsheet ( unless he worked it out and it perfectly matched mine ) for my tax submission. Was a bit of a nightmare to work out.

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I've got a couple shares in AC, plan to do more when I get the funds

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If you cashed in your shareholdings just prior to becoming a tax resident, would that not simplify things?

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other than this thread, is there an investment/trading discussion thread somewhere?

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I invested in Crypto at the start of 2018... put in $3500 USD into various different coins, some much better than Bitcoin in terms of technology. Within a few months it was worth just $350 thanks to a crash. Yesterday, after holding all those coins for 3 years, it finally got back up to $3500, so I sold it all and cashed out. Crypto currency is speculative gambling, I saw other coins go from 90c up to $32, but I just didn't pick the right one. There's no intrinsic value, it's just a fad that could crash again any time. If you can extract wealth from other people getting suckered in, good for you, but I'm just so done with the whole thing.

Now I just put money in an index fund in a TFSA. I've used Vanguard's VUS.TO ETF and its grown steadily over the past few years.

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I think I may have put the kiss of death on bitcoin, since I bought in a few days ago it's down 5%! 😭

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https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/british...c71152a852.jpg

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I'm in Vanguard's S&P 500 tracker and it's nice and stable growth.

My top performer has been an ETF. The ticker is: XWD https://www.blackrock.com/ca/investo...ssthrough=true

I wish I had got in 5 years earlier as it has tripled since it's launch. I got in in 2016 though and it has still grown about 60%

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The TFSA GIC's I took out with Scotiabank have shown next to nothing after 3 years. Can I transfer them or can I start new TFSA's with an independent advisor like Edward Jones ?

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Dogecoin is where it's at!

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I set up Scotia iTrade which allowed me to trade much more widely than Scotiabank were allowing me. I then move and transfer things around myself.

You can work with an independent advisor if you like. They'll factor is what level of risk you want to have and guide you on where to put your money. Do bare in mind that some funds pay them more fees than others so there will likely be some bias.

I have a degree in Accounting and Finance so do my own stuff but professionals are worth their weight if you are new or not sure what to do.