# Can anyone explain this to me?



## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

I appears that I received a dividend from EnCana in the amount of $20.67, yet, $20 was taken back. Why is this?

Why does it say "Adjusted rate"? 

*1/3/12* DIV DIV 0 0.00 ($20.00) ENCANA CORP CASH DIV ON 100 SHS REC 12/15/11 PAY 12/30/11 CXL 12/30 *DIV TO ADJ RATE* CAD ECA 

*1/3/12* DIV DIV 0 0.00 $20.67 ENCANA CORP CASH DIV ON 100 SHS REC 12/15/11 PAY 12/30/11 CAD ECA


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## 0xCC (Jan 5, 2012)

Are you holding shares from the US exchange in a Canadian dollar account (or vice versa)? That wouldn't explain why $20.67 had a $20 adjustment though. It seems like for 100 shares you should have received $20.30, not $20.67.


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## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

Nevermind, I figured it out.

I'm not sure if I can delete threads or not/how to do it? 

A Mod can feel free to delete this thread if they wish. Thank you.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

What was it? Just curious.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

i keep posting about this issue. I'm resigned that so many people don't get it. But hey, it's the brokers who are making a hidden FX fee off some of your canadian dividends & you could easily prevent this if you wanted to.

encana is another canadian co whose dividends are primarily paid in USD. Dividends are not paid in both currencies, they are issued in one currency only.

numerous canadian companies pay their divs primarily in USD. These companies include most big miners, many big energies like eca, most big ag plus a few others like thomson reuters.

if an investor keeps these stocks in his canadian account, his broker will pay the dividend into said account in CAD alright, but only after gobbling up the standard FX fee, which over time will add up to a lot of money gone to the broker for no reason.

the solution is easy. Hold these stocks in a USD account. Some smaller brokers make mistakes over this, but the big bank brokers will get it straight. Investors at big bank brokers will not pay any US withholding tax. Investors at bb brokers will receive full canadian dividend tax credits, although the amounts will be stated on a T5 in US dollars.

last time we went over this issue, four Pillars said it was his opinion that brokers are seizing just a little FX fee on these dividends paid into canadian account ... not the full fee, mind you, pillars opined ... no ... just a reasonable kind of smaller fee he said ... lol

& on the same topic mode said he thought the brokers are not seizing FX fee at all ...

you can see that alas i am up against a wall of stubborn ignorance here, but in my dumb flour-and-water pastry kind of way i will persist in saying Do. not. keep. canadian. companies. that. pay. dividends. initially in. US. dollars. in. canadian. dollar. accounts.

as for kaeJS, it's obvious his broker initially made a mistake in calculating the applicable FX rate on the div, which is basically USD $.20. Apparently the broker decided it had not charged enough FX, so it corrected its first entry.

a lot of canadians own encana, so if one multiplies each dividend across the nation, the total dividend FX grab is very lucrative for the brokers.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> *Do. not. keep. canadian. companies. that. pay. dividends. initially in. US. dollars. in. canadian. dollar. accounts.*


This is information that people would normally not know, unless they were told, so consider yourselves now informed/warned for the umpteenth time.  

Given that mentioned companies are Canadian, as hp also mentioned, there are no withholding taxes and are eligible for the dividend tax credit [only foreign companies would not qualify for the credit].

Mistakes are often made, even by bb's, but by the time I review my transaction history, the corrections have been made.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

humble_pie said:


> last time we went over this issue, four Pillars said it was his opinion that brokers are seizing just a little FX fee on these dividends paid into canadian account ... not the full fee, mind you, pillars opined ... no ... just a reasonable kind of smaller fee he said ... lol
> 
> & on the same topic mode said he thought the brokers are not seizing FX fee at all ...


The issue of FX fee on the dividend did cross my mind while I asked KaeJS for the reason, but I had dismissed it because of the amount involved.
So out of a total payout of $20.67, they took $20 as FX fee?
Which means in the end, the investor got 67c. dividend for the 100 shares held?
I am speechless.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Obviously the error had nothing to do with any such fees, but brokers make a lot of errors in general. 

Last month I was paid $400 extra dividends for a stock of mine when the actual div. was $180.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

Toronto.gal said:


> Obviously the error had nothing to do with any such fees, but brokers make a lot of errors in general.


Now, I am confused - are you saying KaeJS's issue was _not _the FX fee on the dividends as humble_pie suggested above?
What was it then?


> Last month I was paid $400 extra dividends for a stock of mine when the actual div. was $180.


How do I sign up with that brokerage?
I am obviously trading with the wrong set of people


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

hooo ray poor dumb pie is finally getting through to some bright bulbs 

as toronto.gal says "this is information that people would normally not know, unless they were told ... "

not only do the brokers not tell the client or show the client anywhere on statements that the FX heist on dividends is being silently conducted, but many licensed discount brokers' reps don't know about this, so if you ask them In What Currency is encana dividend paid, they will innocently say Yes yes in canadian dollars.

what's worse is that some company IRs don't know about the broker shenanigans. I remember asking at cnr years ago - because it's largely a US railroad now - whether its dividend is paid primarily in USD or CAD. Oh, you can have your dividend in either currency, whichever you please, they said (ps cnr divs are paid in CAD.)

btw how to tell ? best way, olympic gold approach, is read the company website.

however, there is a quick n easy way to tell in which currency a canadian dividend gets primarily issued. Later on today i will post this up.

in the meantime, what i imagine is happening in kae's account is that broker is working its way through initial FX calculation error. To correct this error, broker has to retract the entire dividend & restart from the beginning ...


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> 1. Now, I am confused - are you saying KaeJS's issue was _not _the FX fee on the dividends as humble_pie suggested above?
> What was it then?
> 
> 2. How do I sign up with that brokerage?
> I am obviously trading with the wrong set of people


1. Well, I never said it was, did I? I think hp jumped to conclusions, but never mind, it was a good reminder about those fx fees just the same.

IDK what it was, Kae will end the suspense for us I suppose. 

At first I thought he was dripping and forgot about it, but nope, don't think so because when was the last time the stock was in the $20's.  

2. Investors Edge, lol. I did not even have to call them as they corrected the mistake by the time I read my transaction history. They made a handful of errors in 2011 and you know this because they can't delete the incorrect record once is up, here is example of such error: [I had been paid a much higher rate than the $.42].

"BP P L C SPONSORED ADR (FRM BP AMOCO PLC) : (FRM BP AMOCO PLC) AS OF 06/28/11 CXL CSH *DIV WRONG RATE* S/B U$0.42"


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

i'm not jumping to conclusions.

i said i imagine kae's broker is trying to correct a wrong FX calculation & has to carry this out by retracting the entire div & restarting the entry ... imagine is wot i said.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

I was responding to Harold's post, not yours btw, which came after my response above.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

but t.gal here's what you did say at 11:47 this am:
_
" I think hp jumped to conclusions ... "_


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## doctrine (Sep 30, 2011)

This is interesting. BPO pays their dividends to Canadian shareholders in Canadian dollars, but appear to convert it on their own before sending it out. For their dividend on 30 Dec 2011, as far as I can tell, the dividend was about 0.38% less when calculating with the closing exchange rate on the record date of 1 Dec. That may be the fee they incurred, or the dollar was 0.38% higher during the day and then closed lower.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> but many licensed discount brokers' reps don't know about this, so if you ask them In What Currency is encana dividend paid, they will innocently say Yes yes in canadian dollars....


Yes, they will say: if you have it in your US account, you will be paid in USD$ without fees; if you have it in your CDN account, you will be paid in CDN$ without fees.

I happen to have CNI on the US side for my own specific reasons, but to emphasize what hp was saying, on my last dividends paid on Dec. 30th, I paid in conversion fees, $.51 cents per 100 shares, so while it may not be a big amount for investors [depending on # of shares one owns], it's certainly a lot of money for brokers.

I called Magna today to find out in what currency they pay the dividend and was told my broker should know & that they are not investing advisors.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> but t.gal here's what you did say at 11:47 this am:
> _
> " I think hp jumped to conclusions ... "_


I had not seen your 11:40 post when I typed my 11:47; if you noticed, it was longer than a single line.

Sometimes I start a post and need to attend to other things, then come back to complete the post, hence it took those 7 long minutes. 

Your very 1st post here was about fx fees, from the 1st line, no? That is what I was referring when answering Harold.

Why am I even explaining myself....sigh


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

_
" I called Magna today to find out in what currency they pay the dividend and was told my broker should know & that they are not investing advisors. "_

isn't that terrible. Sigh. But the sad fact is that even some IR reps don't know beans. An inexperienced/non-knowledgeable rep will indeed make a foolish remark like the above.

as i mentioned i have a handy & simple rule for easily determining what is the primary currency of a canadian dividend. I will post it up some time today & before i do i will look up Magna as an example


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

doctrine so sorry but i actually don't believe that any company ever issues its dividend in more than 1 currency.

i do believe that every canadian company issues dividends in one currency only. A number of canadian companies have chosen to issue divs in USD primarily, as has been mentioned. This makes sense when their operations & revenues are largely in USD.

i also believe that this issue is both little-known & complex, so even some company's IRs & websites don't understand how to deal with it.

from the research i've done, the dollars for any single dividend make their way from the div-paying corporation to the cds system & the transfer agents, still in the original currency & still as an uncut lump sum.

cds parcels out dividend monies to the brokerage houses according to the shares held by the ultimate beneficial owners on the record date. These monies are still in the original currency.

my research so far tells me that it is the brokers who extract 100% of the FX fee while distributing the dividend monies correctly into the accounts of the ultimate beneficial owners.

they all do deny it, of course. I'd certainly be very happy to learn more 

what i don't know, for example, is whether the "handlers" in the long chain of dividend transmission are using an FX rate from the day of declaration of a dividend (this seems fair) or from the record or X date or from the payable date. Or what.


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## Cal (Jun 17, 2009)

Hmm. Didn't know that, but it does make sense.

Thx for sharing HP, we will have to reference this thread in the future as I am sure that it will get asked again.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

humble_pie said:


> A number of canadian companies have chosen to issue divs in USD primarily, as has been mentioned. This makes sense when their operations & revenues are largely in USD.


Are all such Canadian companies that pay dividends in USD inter-listed as well?
I'd think so - it would be weird for a company listed only on the TSX to pay dividends in USD - but I am not sure.

Assuming all such companies are inter-listed, wouldn't it make sense to buy such stocks on the US exchange (using USD) instead of on the TSX and bypass the entire FX nonsense altogether?
Only issue would be if such stock happens to be a low-volume or PINK sheet/OTC listed in the US.

This thread is a good reminder for me to go back and ensure all the stocks I own in TSX/CAD accounts pay their dividends in CAD.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

Toronto.gal said:


> I was responding to Harold's post, not yours btw, which came after my response above.


A sign the quoting police are over enforcing?


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Sampson said:


> A sign the quoting police are over enforcing?


I like to quote for clarity purposes [within reason because I don't like to upset TRM]. 

Actually, I had quoted Harold correctly & that should have made the content of my text clear.

Nothing clearer though, than the late Ms. Taylor's 33.09 carat diamond ring, which sold for $USD 8.8 million last month [after the conversion fee, lol].

Posting it for clarity.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

(section A): it occurs to me that there must be some collaboration between the brokerages & the cds system with or without the transfer agents, because when a dividend is paid initially in USD, every broker in canada pays it into clients' canadian accounts at exactly the same rate, at least thomson quotes indicate this.

(section B): magna is a perfect example of how to determine the primary currency of a canadian dividend.

the curious investor would pull up detailed quotes for both MG (canada) & MGA (us.) Quotes that are capable of carrying dividends out to 4 decimal places.

the annual dividend for mga us is a clean 1.00. Whereas the same for mg canada is a ragged 1.0188, according to thomson. This information tells the reader that magna pays primarily in USD. The 1.0188 is simply the one US dollar, converted at a particular FX rate that was profitable for the broker.

some pairs are not quite so obvious. A quote showing quarterly dividends might display .375 on the US side, for example. Already this clean rounded figure is suggesting that USD is the primary currency of the dividend. If, meanwhile, the canadian quote is reporting the dividend as a ragged .3824, what one has likely got here is another post-conversion dividend that was initially paid in USD.

(aside to harold) no need to buy in usd. Investor who has both accounts can buy in either, depending on what kind of cash he has on hand, what the volumes are on the respective exchanges, what the buying opportunities are.

brokers will journal the shares to the permanent destination account - after the T+3-day settlement period - without any charge.

if buying in usd, investor should record the purchase at the proper conversion rate (use bank of canada rates) in his spreadsheets, ledgers etc so he'll have this record for tax purposes.

keep in mind that a nice by-product of these cross-currency trades is that they are forms of gambitting. Essentially the investor is tacking back & forth & avoiding all FX fees ...


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

Thanks for the information humble.

When I called Magna earlier today, they told me they pay in CDN and when I asked a 2nd time for accuracy, I was told that my broker should be providing the information blah, blah.


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## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> i imagine kae's broker is trying to correct a wrong FX calculation & has to carry this out by retracting the entire div & restarting the entry ...


Humble was right on the money.

What they did was give me a dividend for $20.00CAD, then reversed this $20.00CAD and deposited a new dividend of $20.67CAD. 

I didn't know this thread was going to create such a conundrum when I posted it.  I had just woke up when I posted the thread, though, so I don't think my brain was fully functioning yet.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

actually it was a case of one tiny slipup by kaeJS' broker that lifted the veil to reveal a huge practice by all brokers that is normally hidden.

i mean the ancient cross-canada broker-wide practice of charging FX upon canadian dividends paid out by canadian companies in US dollars when these dividends are deposited into canadian dollar brokerage accounts.

kaeJS i am wondering whether, in your case, it was the mistake in the first FX calculation for the encana dividend that produced the Error Correction which showed you that something unusual was happening.

put another way, it is likely, is it not, that if your broker had just deposited CAD 20.67 into your account in the first place, you would never have noticed anything because you would have assumed that 20.67 was the correct dividend.

i think most people automatically assume, when they own canadian stocks that pay dividends & they hold these stocks in a canadian brokerage account, that there is zero FX involved. But for quite a long time now i've been posting here in cmf forum that some canadian dividends - more than one would ever think - are paid primarily in USD, which means that an FX fee is indeed charged somewhere along the way to convert these divs into CAD.

there is no known master list of canadian companies paying US dollar dividends. Just like which brokers offer easy online gambitting & which brokers do not, the information has to be cobbled together by hand here in cmf forum.

what i know is that US dividend payors include nearly all or possibly all of the big miners, some but not all of the big energy, most of the big ag, plus assorted odds & sods such as thomson reuters. Brookfield properties is a new one to me but yes, it pays a .14 dividend in usd only.

magna pays in usd. Husky energy - harold is going to be so happy - pays in cad. Talisman is a canadian energy that only a few months ago switched & commenced paying its dividends in US dollars (note for t.gal).

the dividend FX effect doesn't really matter imho if investor has only 100 shares or intends to hold short-term. But anybody holding more than 500 shares for say a year or more might wish to avoid the FX problem by keeping stocks that pay US dollar dividends in US dollar accounts.

keep in mind that investors who are actively using margin should consider the effect upon margin if a bunch of stocks get journalled over to US account. Available CAD margin wlll decrease while USD margin will increase.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> Talisman is a canadian energy that only a few months ago switched & commenced paying its dividends in US dollars (note for t.gal).


Merci bien.

I own TLM on both exchanges [as I have some in registered accounts]. When I divide the payment I received a few days ago by the # of shares I own, I was paid $.1377 CDN per share & figured that I was charged $4.87 in fees. 

Little escapes hp's eagle eye; you're better than the very handsome detective Murdoch. I just love the 'retrofuturism' feel of Murdoch Mysteries and it's all Canadian, how about that?! 

Anyone watches it?
http://maplemuse.wordpress.com/2011/07/18/murdoch-mysteries/


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> I am speechless.


I guess that makes 2 of us Harold.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

talk about splitting hairs here we go again ... since sometimes there can be a bit of confusion about this ... one has to keep in mind that there are 2 components to what becomes, in the end, one single FX rate charged by brokers, banks et al.

one is the actual moneymarket centre negotiated rate for megamillion $$ exchanges. These are giant moneycentre banks in london, new york, singapore. I'm not sure if canada even has a bank that counts.

these rates fluctuate every minute & bank of canada noon & closing rates are based upon these. Sometimes referred to as the "wholesale rate."

such rates cannot be escaped. Everybody will pay them.

on top of these basic exchange rates, finance institutions such as banks, brokers, credit card companies, etc all add their own service fees for carrying out exchange transactions for their clients.

as folks are discovering, these FX fees charged by their friendly neighbourhood institution are pretty steep. They are to be avoided whenever possible imho.

tactics such as lodging canadian stocks that pay dividends in US dollars in US dollar brokerage accounts & also gambitting are tactics that avoid or sidestep the extra FX fees. These tactics permit a retail investor to pay no more than the moneycentre/wholesale exchange rate.


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

humble_pie said:


> magna pays in usd. Husky energy - harold is going to be so happy - pays in cad. Talisman is a canadian energy that only a few months ago switched & commenced paying its dividends in US dollars (note for t.gal).


Yep, I double checked HSE and it pays in CAD so I'm happy.
I checked all of my CAD A/C holdings and there were only two obvious culprits - Potash & Agrium.
But those are small holdings and I have often traded them away before receiving a divy.
This time though I think I'm stuck with the Jan dividends for a small # of shares.

Only one I am not 100% sure of yet is ESI.
Their website doesn't indicate USD dividends, however, they haven't updated the website since 2009.


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## webber22 (Mar 6, 2011)

TMX.com shows if the dividend is in US or CDN

ESI Dividend: 0.105 CAD


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## underemployedactor (Oct 22, 2011)

My RBC DI account clearly states in the quote details what currency the divvy is paid in - in bold caps no less, so no great mystery there. Speaking of mystery, Toronto gal, you'll be pleased to know that Murdoch Mysteries has been renewed by CBC for another season, despite announcing earlier they were cancelling it. Now you don't have to just wait for those CIBC ads to get your Yannick Bisson fix


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## londoncalling (Sep 17, 2011)

webber22 said:


> TMX.com shows if the dividend is in US or CDN
> 
> ESI Dividend: 0.105 CAD


Thanks for the link. Makes it nice and easy for me.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

actor it's not a question of in which currency an investor receives his dividend, ie in which currency a broker deposits a dividend into investor's account. It's a question of in which currency a dividend is initially issued by a canadian company.

and if said dividend is initially issued in USD, then it becomes a question of whodunnit. Who converted the dividend along the way for ultimate deposit in CAD to canadian investors with canadian dollar brokerage accounts. Who benefited from charging an FX fee.

my best guess is the brokers dunnit. Possibly via the cds system. Which is, after all, broker-owned.


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## underemployedactor (Oct 22, 2011)

Humble, agree entirely, but doesn't it make sense that if the dividend is expressed in US dollars in the quote details then it must ipso facto have been paid in US dollars?


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

underemployedactor said:


> Toronto gal, you'll be pleased to know that Murdoch Mysteries has been renewed ...... Now you don't have to just wait for those CIBC ads to get your Yannick Bisson fix


Nice to know, thank you!


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

no, makes no sense. Data delivered in quote feeds are not true indicators of exactly what dividend amount will be delivered to an investor's account. When dividends cross currencies, FX fees apply.

this morning a leading online broker confirmed to me that they are charging a full FX fee upon every single canadian dividend paid out initially in US dollars by a canadian company that is delivered to a canadian dollar investment account.

if one checks around, one will find out that all other brokers are doing the same.

this hidden FX charge is quite heinous imho because it is not only so huge - there are many of these canadian companies paying millions of US $$$ in dividends each quarter - but also the FX charge is being kept so hidden & secret.

the solution to the problem is simple. Keep canadian dividend payors of US dollar dividends in US dollar accounts. This will work fine at the big bank-owned brokerages. I'd be concerned about the smaller privately-owned onliners. One hears, variously, that at these small firms the canadian dividend tax credits could be lost, ignored or denied. This would be an unfortunate result.


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## Eclectic12 (Oct 20, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> Yep, I double checked HSE and it pays in CAD so I'm happy.
> I checked all of my CAD A/C holdings and there were only two obvious culprits - Potash & Agrium.
> 
> [ ... ]


Did you buy the Agrium on a US exchange? 

The AGU shares I bought on the TSX paid CAD dividends last year. POT dividends, on the other hand are in USD, with the exchange tacked on. 

It's the first time I've had USD dividends from a Canadian company, bought on the TSE. Though I did notice that one of my limited partnerships has converted and is also now paying USD dividends.

*sigh*


Oh well, it was a long run without having to worry about these things.


Cheers


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

Eclectic12 said:


> Did you buy the Agrium on a US exchange?
> The AGU shares I bought on the TSX paid CAD dividends last year.


I bought AGU on TSX.
AGU's website states that dividends are USD:
http://www.agrium.com/investors/agrium_faqs.jsp#q628
Are you sure AGU paid CAD dividends last year, and it simply wasn't your brokerage that auto-converted the dividends from USD to CAD?


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## Eclectic12 (Oct 20, 2010)

HaroldCrump said:


> I bought AGU on TSX.
> AGU's website states that dividends are USD:
> http://www.agrium.com/investors/agrium_faqs.jsp#q628
> Are you sure AGU paid CAD dividends last year, and it simply wasn't your brokerage that auto-converted the dividends from USD to CAD?


Hmmm ... good point. I'll have to check the reported dividends versus what I was paid to be sure. The POT dividend lists the conversion as part of the transaction but now that I think about it, I'm not aware of anything that would require the broker to report the transactions in this fashion for all dividends.

I'll check it out ...


Cheers


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

The Agrium dividend came in this morning.
For 100 shares (that made the record date), I was paid $22.88 but the declared dividend is USD $0.225.
So I think we can confirm that AGU pays in USD and the brokerage is converting when depositing into CAD accounts.

As HP said above, not a sign, or even a whiff within the account statement, that a FX conversion was applied.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

yes, brokers are silently hitting investors for substantial FX fees on numerous canadian companies that issue their dividends in US dollars only.

the list of which canadian companies issue USD divs is a lot longer & bigger than most investors realize.

evidence appears nowhere. Most canadian investors will never guess, have never guessed, that dividends from a canadian company, bought in canada & paid for with canadian dollars, are subject to a hidden 1.50-2% haircut in FX fees by all brokers. I mean, who ever heard of anything so unjust.

all this hardly matters for short-term holdings but for folks holding longterm, it's a big haircut that can easily be avoided.

solution is to hold these stocks in US account. As i've mentioned before, these canadian dividends will not be subject to US withholding. Big bank brokers will render accurate T5s showing all eligible canadian dividend tax credits. Unfortunately, it's rumoured that some small privately-owned online brokers have problems with this or else refuse entirely to deal with the tax creds.

how to find out ? no use asking your online broker or even your full-service broker. Most of the front-line reps don't know about this. The deep piecrust is bringing you deep secret information, so it's up to you to bother to confirm or not.

upthread a helpful poster has posted that the tmx website shows the currency of the dividend. I've done a few spot checks & so far i find that tmx dot com is up-to-date.

ps harold your broker's exchange rate seems awfully low to me, that's really rubbing salt in the wound.


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> 1. no use asking your online broker or even your full-service broker. Most of the front-line reps don't know about this.
> 
> 2. The deep piecrust is bringing you deep secret information, so it's up to you to bother to confirm or not.


1. I wonder if they really don't know or whether they misinform you on purpose; the latter would be much worse. 

I recall when asking for share certificates, they tried their best to change my mind going on and on about all the cons, but nothing about the pros, so I'm not so sure about the sr. reps. not knowing about the fx charge.

2. Yes, you have and have repeated this at least 5x, so no reason for any senior member here not to be informed. Information was much appreciated.


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## humble_pie (Jun 7, 2009)

t.gal, the reps really don't know. They're not trained on this issue.

the senior managers know, of course.

sorry if you think i've over-mentioned the issue, but the fact is nobody ever understood until you & harold crump.

hundreds of thousands of canadian investors are being taken advantage of, with respect to gazillions of dividends.

so 2 smart investors out of maybe a million is a very poor success rate, wouldn't you say.

would you like deep pie to cease mentioning the topic ? Certainly i'll cease if you like. I just thought the knowledge might be helpful to others, because the solution is so simple ...


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## Toronto.gal (Jan 8, 2010)

humble_pie said:


> 1. the senior managers know, of course.
> 
> 2. sorry if you think i've over-mentioned the issue, but the fact is nobody ever understood until you & harold crump.


1. I know jr. reps are oblivious to a lot of stuff.  
2. You misunderstood; I meant that it was kind of you to persevere & educate here. I was merely emphasizing that since you have mentioned it many times, that there should be more than just 2 smart investors here, wait, I meant 3.


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## kcowan (Jul 1, 2010)

I have not contributed but I have made a note to go through my holdings! Tks.


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## Sampson (Apr 3, 2009)

humble_pie said:


> solution is to hold these stocks in US account.


And remember, no need to Gambit, just buy them on the TSX, and have them journaled to the US account, no fees involved (other than the single commission paid in CAD).


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## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

In the case of Agrium from this morning, I was expecting this to happen based on this thread but knew it would be only 100 shares that made the ex date (I had sold a bunch before then).
Anyhow, I called my brokerage (Scotia iTrade) for some other business, and mentioned this to the agent.

He freely admitted that they do charge FX conversion of USD dividends, regardless of whether it is a Canadian company or not.
What matters is the currency of the divy, not the country where the stock is listed.
The only thing that the listing exchange drives is tax with holding or not.

Now I don't know whether this was a jr. agent or sr. but seemed know exactly what I was talking about the moment I brought it up.

On a slightly different note, while shopping for a brokerage that allow seamless USD and CAD transactions inside RRSP a while ago, I had called a few brokerages.
Some brokerages have this "wash" of USD trades.
Others like iTrade have this special USD RRSP account for an additional fee in exchange of forgoing the extra FX fee on US trades (i.e. no wash necessary).
When I asked about USD dividends, they freely admitted that dividends will incur the FX fee built into the conversion rate.
Both Scotia iTrade (for their USD RRSP a/c) and RBC DI admitted this.

Anyhow I'd say many agents (if not most) are probably aware of these hidden fees but don't volunteer this information unless explicitly asked in crystal clear terms, and/or they realize the person at the other end of the phone knows what he/she is talking about.

At that time, I didn't know about the issue with USD dividends by TSX listed companies, which is the sneakiest and darkest of issues in this whole saga.

I think HP gets the gold star for raising it for the first time (not just on this thread, but previously on other threads too).


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