Stock price when the opinion was issued
A number of providers have got quant methods. Basically they take a bunch of value propositions such as P/E ratios, dividend growth, sales, BV, etc. and overlay an ETF with it. In some instances he kind of likes them, especially if is dealing with something like Europe where there is a dividend play going on, but for the US he is really not that interested. For Europe, yes take a look at it.
A good ETF for global diversification of a portfolio? He doesn’t see anything wrong with this ETF. Royal Bank has been initially dabbling in the ETF market with a bunch of bond ETF’s. Now they have about 6-8 ETF’s. Rather than doing what most other ETF providers do, farming out the actual management, they are doing it on their own with their own in-house people.