A Comment -- General Comments From an Expert (A Commentary)

How to rebalance 10 dividend growth and growth stocks as a 26-year-old investor? He's misguided. Don't look at dividends, but total returns, at age 26. Too young. Berkshire Hathaway pays no dividend, because it is concerned solely on growth. DRIPs, if you're worried about being too concentrated, then turn off the DRIP and invest those dividends elsewhere.

Market Outlook He thinks that sometime before the next Presidential election there will be a US-China trade deal. He is interested in what he sees as the market moving away from momentum into value stocks -- financials and industrials. Markets outside of the US are improving, including Europe, emerging markets and Canada. He sees valuations in Europe and Japan now being of much better value -- stocks in the US are not cheap. It may be time for more active management, as the US indices may not reflect what is going on globally. He has deployed some of his cash holdings recently and is looking to buy value when the opportunity presents itself.

Gold miners? You only want to own commodities when their price is doing well. Gold prices are doing well. The problem with miners is that share prices get separated from the commodity prices at times. There are always operational issues. He prefers holding Franco-Nevada as it is a royalty structure and not dependent on a single mine. He thinks gold prices are in a corrective phase, but poised to go higher.

Record highs in the S&P500. TSX is also very close to hitting all time highs. People are buying because markets are going up. There are some concerns that the markets are going to fall down again. However, the breakout we’ve seen this month is distinctive as we are breaking above new levels.

Half of the gain this year is a recovery from last year. We’re up 2-4% annualized, depending on which market you look at, so there is still lots of volatility.

Right now, compared to 2 years ago, it’s been steady so you definitely have to trade to get good performance.

Moving averages are good to find an exit point. Looking for crossover of several moving averages could indicate its momentum.

Market. It seems like every week or month there is another notch taken off the recession argument and thesis. The quarterly results are not shooting the lights out but they are encouraging. You would have seen some kind of reduction in job numbers before a recession. Recession fears are being calmed. What if markets didn’t go down that much during a recession. Are you positioned for that? Tech and consumables are the most interesting in Canada.

Volume in the markets today on trade optimism. Any positive news is positive for the markets.

Different strategy to get through the end of the year vs. kickstarting 2020? Great year so far. Underlying fundamentals look pretty good. Little bumpy till the end of the year. Next year should be positive.

Will liquidity work its way through the system from January 2020 onwards? The 3 Fed rate cuts will start to move liquidity through and help companies. Any incremental positive on the trade side will be a huge positive. Hopefully momentum will carry through into 2020.

How are the earnings so far? Estimates are too high compared to actual economic growth. Disney, however, seems to be firing on all cylinders.

Market Outlook The market is telling you the summer was full of political bad news. The last six months the market is not down, where is all the gloom. The market is behaving as it should. Rates are as low as they can get, you are not seeing it help the economy. The psychology is positive right now. The Dow is following the previous bull market that ran 1982-2000 -- it has about 10 years to go. He doesn't expect a 20-30% plunge is coming.

Why are REITs selling off? REITs are falling off on the threat of bond yields rising again. If bonds go up, it will create competition and money will move to safer yields.

Canadian Economy The Canadian economy is disappointing because a large portion of the driving force is being held back from contributing fully (interviewer, "You mean oil and gas"). Hopefully now a minority government and the two main partners agree on energy to allow the correct legislation to allow the energy space to grow again. China has hurt us as well.