# Making the switch: TD e-series index funds -> ETFs



## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

I've been investing with TD e-series for almost about 2 years now and I think it's time I finally make the jump to ETFs to save on the MER. But before I do that, I have a few questions:

1) I'm wondering if there is an efficient way to make the switch? If I were to sell the e-series and then buy the ETF, I'd have to wait a few days in each direction for it to settle/process (or maybe the ETF purchase is instantaneous?). I don't want to lose out on any gains in the interim (of course, it could potentially go the other way as well). Is there a way to do a seamless transition, e.g. if I call TD would they be able to do it faster than if I did it myself online? Or is there even a point to this--maybe the few days would be negligible? (I'd just really be mad at myself if I missed a good day--and I seem to remember reading that missing out on a good day can be very costly.)

2) One of my e-series funds is held in my non-registered account, which means I will trigger capital gains taxes of about $850 if I sell it now. If I were to switch to the ETF, I'd be saving about $50 annually in the MER difference (if I did the math correctly.) I do plan on holding the ETF for at least 20 more years, so that would add up to $1000 over that time period (but of course, things could change). Am I correct in deciding to just take the tax hit and get it over with right now? After all, I'll have to pay it eventually anyways, right?

3) One thing I really like about the TD e-series is the flexibility--since there's no commission to buy/sell, it makes it really easy to move money around when I need to. I'm afraid I might feel a bit "locked-in" if I go the ETF route since there's always commissions to worry about. Do any of you feel that this is ever an issue?

Any advice on how you all went about making the switch would be much appreciated!


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

I actually made the switch last year from my mutual fund account at TD to Waterhouse.

1. When you sell your fund, depending on the time you sell it, it will sell end of trading day or end of next trading days. I don't recall if you get the balance immediately or it takes a few days to process. But it doesn't matter because you'll know the number. You can do the math (units x price). So you can make purchases for that much and easily get into the market without being out of it for no more than an hour.

2. Your call on when you sell. You can do the math and figure out if it is worth it to you. Maybe you can wait to a more opportune time (off work or something). Your call.

3. As your portfolio grows its less of a big deal, though you should always want to minimize transactions. You can dollar cost average your money into e-series and once a year make one lump sum purchase of an ETF. If you're worried about selling, or feeling locked into a fund because it costs money to sell, than it's all how you look at it. The less likely I'm going to sell it on a whim.

Advice. If you're going to be a passive index investor, try not to focus so much on your investing. Just enough time to get your business done and that's it. Focus on other things. It makes it easier. I used to watch things like a hawk and really if you're in the game for 20 years the day to day stuff truly means nothing. And that's something you truly need to believe.


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## wendi1 (Oct 2, 2013)

I would be disinclined to take a capital gains hit in my investment account (since you don't need the money, yet). You are not just paying tax on $850, you are giving up all that growth for the next 20 years on that $850. 

This is a subtle question, though, and I doubt there is a right or wrong answer.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

$850 in extra income tax due to capital gains in just one e-series fund held for only 2 years seems a bit high, unless the holding is surprisingly large.

(aside to cj) wondering whether this is the estimated tax dollar amount itself or whether it might be the amount of the actual gain?


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Thanks for the advice everyone!



eulogy said:


> 1. When you sell your fund, depending on the time you sell it, it will sell end of trading day or end of next trading days. I don't recall if you get the balance immediately or it takes a few days to process. But it doesn't matter because you'll know the number. You can do the math (units x price). So you can make purchases for that much and easily get into the market without being out of it for no more than an hour.


I'm a bit confused--how can I only be out of the market for less than an hour if it takes a few days for the balance to process? Wouldn't I be out of the market for all of those days?

(And yes, I definitely focus too much on the little things sometimes...I think I've been getting better at ignoring it than I was at first though! )



humble_pie said:


> (aside to cj) wondering whether this is the estimated tax dollar amount itself or whether it might be the amount of the actual gain?


I was intending to calculate the tax portion only...however, I did go back to my spreadsheet and realized I made 2 mistakes: a small part of the gain was actually due to a separate fund that I later transferred into my RRSP (meaning it would have triggered a tax in 2013 already, which I will have to claim it on this year's tax return anyways). So after removing that, the total gain is about $3400. However, I also just realized about $550 of this was actually dividends, which would be taxed anyways (if I understand correctly) so that would be irrelevant to this situation.

After redoing the calculation, the taxes come down to ~$618. Still a good chunk. So I guess I will keep that fund in e-series for now, and if the price falls eventually I'll sell it then?


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

cjk2 said:


> ... the total gain is about $3400. However, I also just realized about $550 of this was actually dividends, which would be taxed anyways (if I understand correctly) so that would be irrelevant to this situation.
> 
> After redoing the calculation, the taxes come down to ~$618. Still a good chunk. So I guess I will keep that fund in e-series for now, and if the price falls eventually I'll sell it then?



ok so the total gain after removing dividends from distorting the real gains figure is (3400-550), or $2850?

of this, only $1425 would be taxable. You are saying that estimated income taxes on this $1425 would be $618? this amount does still seem on the high side to me, wondering if u are in such a high tax bracket?

also, how is it really possible to estimate 2014 income taxes at this point in time? we are only in february, which is month numero 2. Many things are yet to happen over the remaining 10 months of 2014.


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## Dibs (May 26, 2011)

Last December I switched my TD e-series to cheaper ETFs. Here is a quote from my money diary:



> TD Canadian Index-e (TDB900) --> Vanguard FTSE Canada All Cap Index (VCN)
> TD US Index-e (TDB902) --> Vanguard US Total Market (VUN)
> TD International Index-e (TDB911) --> iShares MSCI EAFE IMI (XEF)
> 
> This reduced my average MER from 0.39% to 0.22%, which equals roughly a 45% reduction in the fees I pay. The switch cost me $29.97 for three buy commissions. Spreads on the ETFs were around 2c. I missed 2 days in the market. I will use the dividends from the ETFs to rebalance by buying TD e-series funds.


Regarding the questions in your first post:

1) (RE: efficient ways to trade) It took two days after selling the mutual funds for the trade to settle. At that point I bought the ETFs at market price. 

2) (RE: taxes involved) If you see your tax bracket going up in the future, better to incur the gains now. However if your bracket will go down in the future (i.e. retiring, taking a year off), then you may want to consider holding on until then. Since I'm a student, my tax bracket has nowhere to go but up when I start working, so I took the capital gains hit right away.

3) (RE: Flexibility of e-series vs "locked in" ETFs) That psychological feeling of being "locked in" due to buy/sell fees might actually be benificial to your portfolio, since you are more inclined to leave it alone. Remember that you can always rebalance regularly by buying commission free TD e-series funds.


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

cjk2 said:


> I'm a bit confused--how can I only be out of the market for less than an hour if it takes a few days for the balance to process? Wouldn't I be out of the market for all of those days?
> 
> (And yes, I definitely focus too much on the little things sometimes...I think I've been getting better at ignoring it than I was at first though! )


You're not out of the market while the trade settles a few days later. You buy it at a price and whatever happens in the market over the next few days will be reflected. You don't have to be out of the market long. You sell your funds and you'll get them at the start of a new trading day. It's not advised to immediately buy at open, but you can get back in the market as soon as you need to.


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## Worm (Nov 18, 2012)

I recently did this switch with an eseries fund and it was simple. Enter the sell order for your fund before 3:00 pm (eastern time) and it will execute end of day. The next business day by around 11am (eastern) the cash will be available to purchase the new ETF. With TDW though you need to go into the equity order form and look at the real time cash balance to see it though. It's possible the cash is there even earlier, but I'm out in AB so by the time I usually get around to things it is later out east.


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Thanks for all the input! It's reassuring that the turnaround time for e-series -> cash is less than a day. For some reason I always feel like there's such a delay with e-series transactions, but I guess it's because I usually put money in on Friday (aka pay-day) so I don't see the change until Tuesday.

Alright, I've decided to make the switch for all the funds I have in my TFSA + RRSP, but leave my non-registered account alone for now and see how things go.

Just one more question for eulogy: you mentioned that "it's not advised to immediately buy at open". Is this because the price fluctuates a lot at open? When would be a "safe" time to buy? 9:30, 10:00, 11:00...? (I've never purchased any stocks or ETFs before so this is all new to me!)



humble_pie said:


> of this, only $1425 would be taxable. You are saying that estimated income taxes on this $1425 would be $618? this amount does still seem on the high side to me, wondering if u are in such a high tax bracket?
> 
> also, how is it really possible to estimate 2014 income taxes at this point in time? we are only in february, which is month numero 2. Many things are yet to happen over the remaining 10 months of 2014.


Yes...without getting into the specifics, I think my current calculation is correct. I'm basing my 2014 income taxes on my 2013 tax return (which in turn is quite similar to my 2012 one). So I believe it's a fair extrapolation to make, since I'm not expecting any major changes in the near future. (Of course, I guess I could always get fired in the next 10 months, lol!)


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

> Just one more question for eulogy: you mentioned that "it's not advised to immediately buy at open". Is this because the price fluctuates a lot at open? When would be a "safe" time to buy? 9:30, 10:00, 11:00...? (I've never purchased any stocks or ETFs before so this is all new to me!)


It's not to say that the opening can be any different then the rest of the day. It's just at the start of the day when it shoots up or shoots down. And really it's sort of like noise and the market takes a little bit to find itself. There's no specific time. It's always moving. It's just a general good idea to not go when first opens or at the very last minute of the day. Even things like announcements by the government on economic growth, unemployment and interest rates can cause directional changes.

Don't get too worked up on this sort of thing. I don't worry about government announcements. I'm in it for the long run, so it doesn't matter. I'll buy some time through the day when it's convenient at work and that's about it. If you eventually do Norbert's Gambit to pick up $US dollars, announcements become a bigger deal.


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Ah, ok, thanks for the clarification.

Once again thanks to everyone for the advice--I'm going to take the plunge into ETFs next week so hopefully it'll go smoothly.


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## mrPPincer (Nov 21, 2011)

cjk2, it is possible to do it all in one day and thus avoid the risk of sitting out of the market.

The way I did it in 2012, after I had moved my e-series funds in-kind from my online mutual fund account to my TDWH acct. was,

1. logged in and sold the e-series
2. phoned in and once the broker agent looked to confirm that the order to sell was in, was then able to (at online commish, because the online system wouldn't) put in a limit buy order for an interlisted stock, the total amounting to less than what the estimated closing dollar value of the MFs to be sold. (You could also sell just part of the MFs for a more exact dollar value).
3. sold the interlisted stock with a limit sell order on the US market to complete the Norbert's gambit, (at a slight profit as it happened).
4.bought the Vanguard ETFs on the US market with my shiny new US dollars, all on the same day.
5.next day or so, bought back some e-series with the left-over CDN cash.


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## mrPPincer (Nov 21, 2011)

Forgot to mention, but obviously the above procedure was done in my registered account (cash account gambit would require some journaling).


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Sounds like you've got a perfect system going! I did read into the Norbert's gambit awhile back, since the US ETFs have much lower MERs than the Canadian equivalents. It sounded a bit complicated to me though (I was afraid I'd do something wrong, and wasn't sure if it'd be worth the hassle), so I ended up deciding just to stick to CAD for now. But I think further down the road, once I'm more comfortable with buying/selling ETFs, I will definitely look into that.

By registered account, do you mean a TFSA...? Since TD still doesn't have $US RRSP accounts?


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## mrPPincer (Nov 21, 2011)

It was a RRSP with td, but US$ stocks are traded exactly the same in TFSAs as they are in RRSPs with td.

US based stocks & ETFs however, are generally better held in the RRSP because they are protected from US foreign withholding tax there, whereas in the TFSA their dividends would be taxed with an unrecoverable 15% withholding tax to the IRS.

If you're buying canadian based etfs it's even easier, just step 1 & 2 above, sell e-series in your TDDI account, calculate how many units of ETF you can buy at the current price, phone in your order, (remember to ask for online commish fees), and you're done.


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

How did you manage to get US$ in a TD RRSP? I was under the impression they didn't have that feature set up yet...but maybe I misunderstood. I'd be really interested in this if it's possible.


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## Eclectic12 (Oct 20, 2010)

^^^^^

As a true USD RRSP account - that hasn't been setup and the last I heard, the brokers with it are Questrade, Royal, Bank of Montreal and a few others.

However, you can have autowash setup and use the gambit to buy USD stocks, ETFs etc.

http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/automatic-wash-trading-at-td-waterhouse/
http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/save-on-canadian-dollar-to-us-dollar-conversions-and-vice-versa/


It doesn't deal with the currency exchange on distributions (dividends or otherwise) but it does take care of the main buying/selling.

http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/beware-of-hidden-foreign-currency-conversions/
http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/double-dipping-on-currency-conversions-in-us-dollar-rrsp-drips/


Cheers

*PS*

Actually, I believe buying on US exchanges has always been around as I seem to recall my brother-in-law buying in his TDW RRSP around 2004 and more recently in 2009. The problem has been the rate of currency exchange charged.

The big benefit to a true USD RRSP account that the individual investor controls when any currency exchange happens.


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## mrPPincer (Nov 21, 2011)

You have to do a one-time phone in to have them set up something they call auto-wash, but it's not true US$, they put it in a USD money market fund when you sell a USD stock if you have auto-wash set up.

There are probably some good threads on this here someplace, and I'm sure the Canadian Couch Potato site or Canadian Capitalist's site have some good explanitory write-ups on this.*

With TDDI registered accounts you could even just buy US$ stock with your CDN dollars, and many people do so, often unknowingly ignorant of the fact the exchange rate fee with TD is very high, 1.5%+ extra (over Bank of Canada rates), each way (they don't advertise this, in fact they have often been accused of being quite deceptive about this hidden toll on their customers).

This steep cost can be somewhat avoided however using Norbert's Gambit, and having auto-wash set up in your RRSP, (and TFSA if you plan to trade USD stock in there).

*edit.. Eclectic beat me to it, see the links in Eclectic's post above


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Ahhh, I see, that makes sense to me now--apparently I totally misunderstood what you could or could not do in an RRSP. I think I'll go this route for sure! Those links are very helpful.

What do you guys do about the dividends? Since you can't hold US$ in the RRSP, TD would automatically convert dividends into CAD, and automatically charge the currency exchange fees, right? Or perhaps overall, losing out on that small amount is negligible compared to the MER savings of having a US ETF?

And I realize I'm getting off-topic here, but now that you pointed out the issue of foreign withholding taxes, I'm wondering if I should rearrange my holdings. Currently, my TFSA is split evenly between the US Index and International Index. My non-registered account contains 100% Canadian Index (I honestly can't remember why I decided on this, except that I think I read it somewhere...maybe on the couch potato website). My RRSP is a mix of everything (bond index, US Index, International Index, Canadian Index). In order to minimize withholding taxes, it sounds like I should transfer all the US/International Index into the RRSP. But to make room for that, I would probably have to transfer all my bonds into the TFSA. Now originally, I put 100% of my bond index in my RRSP since that account _will _be taxed eventually, whereas the TFSA is tax-free; I expect much greater gains from the US/International Indexes, so I figured I would pay much less tax upon retirement if those are in the TFSA.

Do you think minimizing withholding taxes now is more beneficial than hoping for tax savings in future retirement? I realize this question might be hard to answer, and sorry if I'm not being clear (I always end up confusing myself when I try to work out optimal tax strategies!).


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

cjk2 said:


> What do you guys do about the dividends? Since you can't hold US$ in the RRSP, TD would automatically convert dividends into CAD, and automatically charge the currency exchange fees, right?


You can DRIP many US ETFs. TD stopped charging the forex fees when you DRIP ETFs. This is a brand new policy, introduced at the end of 2013. I'm guessing that links above don't mention it.


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## richard (Jun 20, 2013)

Withholding taxes and DRIP conversions only apply to dividends which are about 2-3%/year. Don't give up $1 to earn $0.01


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

That's great! I didn't know about the new policy.

I guess I will keep the funds in my TFSA then--I think in the long run it'll work out better than trying to save a bit on withholding taxes now.


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

Yeah. Putting it in your TFSA is better than leaving it out, paying full taxes and getting your withholding taxes on dividends back.

And if you're interested in doing Nobert's Gambit, you can actually open yourself up to some pretty sweet ETFs in the US that blow away anything we can get in Canada. VTI, 0.05%. VXUS 0.14% (just had it's MER reduced two days ago). If you're extra lazy like me, VT 0.18%.


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

I'm definitely looking into the US Vanguard ETFs...wow, their fees are incredible!



eulogy said:


> Yeah. Putting it in your TFSA is better than leaving it out, paying full taxes and getting your withholding taxes on dividends back.


Well, it was more a choice between putting it in TFSA or RRSP...so in scenario A I'd get completely tax-free growth but no withholding taxes back. While in scenario B I'd get tax-free growth _and _withholding taxes back...but later have to pay taxes when I eventually withdraw the money. And it's hard to predict my tax rate in retirement, but I'm guessing those taxes will be higher than the withholding fees, so TFSA it is.


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## mrPPincer (Nov 21, 2011)

wrt IRS dividend withholding taxes, here's a link to a simple guide by Canadian Couch Potato for examples of what fund goes best in which account
http://canadiancouchpotato.com/2012/09/20/foreign-withholding-tax-which-fund-goes-where/

and a link to his prior post which explains in better detail how the differences in how the funds are structured impact how they are taxed and whether that tax might be recoverable in each account type
http://canadiancouchpotato.com/2012/09/17/foreign-withholding-tax-explained/


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## fatcat (Nov 11, 2009)

cjk2 said:


> I'm definitely looking into the US Vanguard ETFs...wow, their fees are incredible!


sure and i have one QQQ which has an mer of .20 ... however, at the moment he usa dollar is pricey for canadians and it may well tick back up in a year or two ... you can get many equivalents of the american etfs in canadian dollar hedged versions for slightly higher mer's ... i might buy those and wait until the dollar came back up again and then switch over to the us version 

also, unless you are buying the really low cost canada etf's like xiu, you do save some on expenses but not a huge amount and td e-series gives you immense flexibility in adding and subtracting money

anyway, good luck, making these shifts costs money and time, i just re-did my whole portfolio and it was a lot of work ... the potatoes are pretty smart in this regard


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

fatcat said:


> however, at the moment he usa dollar is pricey for canadians and it may well tick back up in a year or two ... you can get many equivalents of the american etfs in canadian dollar hedged versions for slightly higher mer's ... i might buy those and *wait until the dollar came back up again* and then switch over to the us version


What if... what if... it doesn't come back?

This presentation by Deutsche Bank is from March 2011. CAD traded at $1.05 USD back then. The presentation shows CAD as 20% overvalued vs. purchasing power parity (see slide 15). $1.05 * 80% = $0.84 fair value.
http://www.euromoneyconferences.com/downloads/fxuk/deutsche.pdf


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

At least with respect to VTI or VOO, waiting for the US dollar to change is irrelevant. Owning it in CAN or US is like weighing yourself in lbs or kg.


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## fatcat (Nov 11, 2009)

GoldStone said:


> What if... what if... it doesn't come back?
> 
> This presentation by Deutsche Bank is from March 2011. CAD traded at $1.05 USD back then. The presentation shows CAD as 20% overvalued vs. purchasing power parity (see slide 15). $1.05 * 80% = $0.84 fair value.
> http://www.euromoneyconferences.com/downloads/fxuk/deutsche.pdf


you may well be right but i tend to think that when keystone gets approved (it will) and the boc raises rates and we see a commodity uptick, i think the CAD will rebound though i may well be wrong well and that would be great for my social security check



> At least with respect to VTI or VOO, waiting for the US dollar to change is irrelevant. Owning it in CAN or US is like weighing yourself in lbs or kg


good point, over the long haul it doesn't matter much, i admit i am guilty of playing the CAD against the USD


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## Kaitlyn (May 13, 2011)

Sorry to jump on this thread with my own question but it's already gotten quite long...

I don't want to convert my non-reg to ETFs because of the capital gains being triggered, but is there any reason I should NOT do this in my RRSP? Following the portfolio on Canadian Couch Potato, it seems like I certainly should given that the model portfolio has a fee of about half that of my low-cost eFunds.


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## eulogy (Oct 29, 2011)

You can always do the math to figure out the pay back period. In an RRSP, there's usually no reason to stop you if you're going to a cheaper fund. As usual in a taxable account, you require a lot more thought.


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

Resurrecting this thread again....recently I've been doing some research into the Norbert's gambit and various ETFs available, and I think I've finally decided on what to do. First the two easy ones:

*TD Bond Index (0.51 MER): *switch to VSB (0.15 MER). From what I understand, VSB is much more short-term than the TD bond index, which I think is preferable since interest rates are currently so low. I'll continue to buy more of the TD bond index biweekly, so I'll still have exposure to longer term bonds.

*TD Canadian Index: *keep it as is (in the non-registered account). I'd save ~$70 annually by going with VCE instead, but incurring hundreds of $ in capital gains taxes is not worth it.


Now the ones I'm having trouble with: US Index (switch to VTI or VUN?) and International Index (switch to VEA or VDU?). Currently I hold half of each in my TFSA and RRSP, but to reduce commissions I've decided to move all of each fund into one account. (i.e. 31k of US equities in TFSA and 31k of international equities in RRSP, OR vice versa.)

*VTI (0.05 MER) vs VUN (0.15 MER): *difference in MER is only 0.10. Even if I do the Norbert's gambit I am likely to lose 0.10% on the currency exchange. If I hold it in my RRSP though, I do get the advantage of no withholding taxes on the VTI (maybe ~0.30%?).

*VEA (0.10 MER) vs VDU (0.28 MER): *difference in MER is 0.18. Currency exchange costs might still eat up much of this difference, but once again, in the RRSP there's the extra advantage of no withholding taxes on VEA.

I'm having trouble figuring out which option is best because I'm not sure exactly what the cost for Norbert's gambit is ($20 in commissions + bid/ask spread of...???) and also how much withholding taxes are (I've seen estimates of ~0.30%, but don't know how accurate this is).

Seems like in the TFSA, it's better to go with the Canadian ETF (since currency exchange costs reduce the benefit of lower MERs), while in the RRSP, it's better to go with the US ETF (due to additional benefits of no withholding taxes). So right now, I'm leaning towards VEA in RRSP (with Norbert's gambit) and VUN in TFSA, because the difference in MERs is greater with VEA/VDU than with VTI/VUN. Does this seem like the right way to go about it?

Thanks again for all the great advice & suggestions!


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## cjk2 (Sep 19, 2012)

*Update: *I finally completed the switch to ETFs today!  Took awhile but I wanted to make sure I understood and could execute the Norbert's gambit correctly. HUGE thanks to everyone who provided invaluable help, especially mrPPincer who suggested using the gambit. I now hold CAB + VXUS in my RRSP, VUN in my TFSA.

Anyways, the gambit itself actually went off _perfectly _without a hitch. I successfully converted ~$29k and was surprised by how easy it was, actually! Unfortunately, I did run into some problems when it came time to buy the VXUS. Somehow I'd missed the detail that TD doesn't actually perform the wash until later, so right after I sold the interlisted stock on the NYSE, I tried to buy VXUS with the proceeds but got an "insufficient funds" error. So I called TD to try and clear that up, but the CSR didn't seem to know anything about auto-wash and kept insisting I had to buy the US Money Market (TDB166) otherwise I'd be charged full forex. Well I gave up on explaining it, and once I hung up, I had to go back to cancel the order he'd placed (incorrectly) and redo the order myself.

But in the 30 minutes that it took to clear up that confusion, VXUS had gone up about 10 cents...so I feel like I lost out on ~$50.  And I ended up only being able to buy 492 units instead of 497 units due to TD not calculating the USD funds correctly, so I'll have some leftover USD at the end.

I was also annoyed to find that the TD e-series US Index had gone up 50 cents today! Right after I switched out of it yesterday--and VUN didn't go up nearly that much. >_< This, plus the $50 lost on VXUS, not to mention commissions and ask/bid spread, was a little hard to stomach, and makes me wonder whether it's really worth it to do the e-series -> ETFs switch...but I guess in the long run things should even out.


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