# How's everyone doing this year?



## 1sImage (Jan 2, 2013)

Market seems to be very hot right now, on the up an up. 
This years been great, very close to hitting 40k profit since Jan1
Guess I gotta thank CP and Keyera for the help.

Hows everyone else doing?


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

Tsk. Tsk. Don't spook the markets.


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## none (Jan 15, 2013)

GoldStone said:


> Tsk. Tsk. Don't spook the markets.


Whatever, even god himself couldn't stop this bull market at this point. *DO YOU HEAR ME GOD???? I DARE YOU*


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## 1sImage (Jan 2, 2013)

none said:


> Whatever, even god himself couldn't stop this bull market at this point. *DO YOU HEAR ME GOD???? I DARE YOU*


"Whats a God to a none believer... who don't believe in anything"


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## Andrej (Feb 25, 2010)

POed that my gold stocks ruined what is otherwise a stellar performance.


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## Feruk (Aug 15, 2012)

Up 13% since Jan 1. Would've been far nicer except for two draggers on my portfolio.


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## namelessone (Sep 28, 2012)

Up 12% YTD

Value investing + Concentrate investing helps big time.

Buffett said it many times but it's very hard to put concentrate investing into practice. One needs to be VERY careful about selections.


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## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

YTD performance is irrelevant. Annualized performance is only slightly less irrelevant. A 5-10-20 year moving average is a lot more relevant.


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

Not sure how much I'm up. All I know is, dividends have increased and indexed products are near all-time highs. 

Kinda sucks actually, I want to buy stocks cheap.


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## doctrine (Sep 30, 2011)

Relative movements can help indicate whether stocks in general are becoming more or less expensive. Since they're up so much over the last 3 months, I'm letting the capital gains do the work and saving money for only good opportunities.


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## lonewolf (Jun 12, 2012)

I dont have a single bad trade that is making money. Better yet I do not have any bad positions making money hand over fist so Iam very happy with how everything is going 

(figure that one out)


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## Homerhomer (Oct 18, 2010)

Posts like this are a clear indication that a correction is coming ;-)

Yes, I am doing well as well.


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## 1sImage (Jan 2, 2013)

lonewolf said:


> I dont have a single bad trade that is making money. Better yet I do not have any bad positions making money hand over fist so Iam very happy with how everything is going
> 
> (figure that one out)


Your happy. And at the end of the day, that's all that really matters.


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## namelessone (Sep 28, 2012)

AltaRed said:


> YTD performance is irrelevant. Annualized performance is only slightly less irrelevant. A 5-10-20 year moving average is a lot more relevant.


If the underlyings don't change much, YTD performance matters a lot. 

Passive CAD positions up 8% YTD . 
More " active" USD positions up 46% YTD . 

Total: Up 27% YTD . 

~30 stocks. 

Lots of gain comes from value investing. It's still worth the time to find a couple temporary bargains and load up.


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## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

namelessone said:


> Lots of gain comes from value investing. It's still worth the time to find a couple temporary bargains and load up.


I never said otherwise. It is just that short term performance means nothing, i.e. it is statistical noise. YTD performance is but a short term aberration. Performance needs to be measured over 5, 10, 15 or even 20 year periods. That value based temporary bargain is only truly meaningful if it performs over a multi-year period.

Example: My purchase of TCK.B at circa $21 during its recent temporary bargain status only 'feels good' now with the stock back up to near $29. It will only prove my decision making if it performs equal to, or better than, TSX performance over a multi-year period.


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

I did a XIRR on all our portfolios last weekend? Can't recall, but it was up 11%, assuming it's Dec 31. 

One TFSA doing poor, it included Rogers, IPL.UN and CU, all three have been hit hard. 

Basic couch potatos are doing well this year too.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

My passive equity ETF portfolio is sitting at about 10% positive (haven't done XIRR and made some big contributions this year). Helped by FXM and VTI and hurt by VEA and VWO. I have a speculative account (VIX futures contango harvesting) that's up about 90% YTD, which is better than expected.


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

I wonder how the couch potato with REIT, Emerging markets and heavy bonds are doing? All those are down this year. I would guess 4-6%, US and VEA doing well.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

I'm not too worried about international stocks performing poorly this year. They are, for the most part, reasonably valued (CAPE) so if anything it means I'm accumulating at reasonable to attractive valuations. For someone who needs to generate income from their portfolio, if they are diversified with Canadian and US equities, they're doing just fine.


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## CanadianCapitalist (Mar 31, 2009)

Jungle said:


> I wonder how the couch potato with REIT, Emerging markets and heavy bonds are doing? All those are down this year. I would guess 4-6%, US and VEA doing well.


Depends on one's allocation to these asset classes. I recently took a look at a couch potato portfolio I've been tracking for a while now. It's up 6.7 percent YTD as of early July.

http://www.canadiancapitalist.com/sleepy-portfolio-2q-2013-update/


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## Adam M. (Aug 7, 2013)

I don't invest, rather trying to pay my debts.
Isn't it closer to a situation of average working Canadian ?
Somehow goes much more difficult this year than last.
But this year is not finished yet .


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## iherald (Apr 18, 2009)

Adam M. said:


> I don't invest, rather trying to pay my debts.
> Isn't it closer to a situation of average working Canadian ?
> Somehow goes much more difficult this year than last.
> But this year is not finished yet .


Keep it up Adam, paying down your debts is a huge pain but super rewarding!


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## Ethan (Aug 8, 2010)

I calculated my annualized return using XIRR for the year to date on my 3 portfolios as follows:

TFSA - 32.71%
RRSP - 7.75%
Margin - 22.11%

Should have done this yesterday, it would have looked a bit better.

The big gainer in my TFSA has been ACQ, it accounts for just over half of my gains.

My RRSP is small both in dollar volume and number of stocks. I hold 4 American stocks - DO, TNH, KO and WMT. Most of the gains have come from the depreciating Canadian dollar, I consider my 7% return to be a disappointment.

Margin account gains have come from profitably selling puts on CN, BMO, TD and Telus. Weighed down by the drop in Telco's a few months back.


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

Wow, great work Ethan. TFSA is a bit down, I hold Telus in there


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## blin10 (Jun 27, 2011)

funny how everyone is posting gains and nobody is posting loses lol... human mentality at work


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## none (Jan 15, 2013)

blin10 said:


> funny how everyone is posting gains and nobody is posting loses lol... human mentality at work


I'm down some - my bonds and REITs have taken a beating and I wasn't sufficiently balanced into US and international to cover it. Close though.

Oh well, long game ammiright?


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## SkyFall (Jun 19, 2012)

thanks to TVIX i'm doing very well  over 20% return (on paper) now on August 30th it's a 1 for 10 reverse spit won't have the same swings....


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

@blin10 - I'm down some, but I haven't sold anything either. Down a few hundred bucks thanks to Telus and Calloway REIT.


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## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

SkyFall said:


> thanks to TVIX i'm doing very well  over 20% return (on paper) now on August 30th it's a 1 for 10 reverse spit won't have the same swings....


Nonononononono, don't use TVIX. Use UVXY if you must, but TVIX has had all kinds of problems in terms of deviating from NAV.

Full disclosure: I hold UVXY puts. I don't think holding long VIX products is wise, unless you have tomorrow's newspaper.


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## indexxx (Oct 31, 2011)

Down a little bit- I have Apple as my main holding, and have held it through the plunge; I got greedy instead of selling it near 700. But mostly balanced out by other gains. VIG, EGHT, and Atlas Pipelines did great for me. And my e-series helped. 

Learned my lesson about having too much in one basket- more towards my moniker henceforth!


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

So far this year basic couch potato is beating my stock picks by about 3-4%. Mainly the drop in telecom and utilities didn't help. But suncor has been great. 

Edit I am comparing against a td eseries couch potato with 10% bonds. Not 40%


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## Jagas (Feb 11, 2013)

RRSP up, TFSA down here. Up a little over 5% year to date combined so far.


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## atrp2biz (Sep 22, 2010)

+3.7%

BRK is a primary holding which has done very well this YTD, offset by RCI.B and some prefs. Dipping in ABX a couple of months ago has helped the cause as well. Sitting on a lot of cash right now (~20%).


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## uptoolate (Oct 9, 2011)

Doing very well. Getting out of Canada and going big into VTI and the USD has made it a great year so far but this too shall pass of course.


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## sprocket1200 (Aug 21, 2009)

My Own Advisor said:


> Not sure how much I'm up. All I know is, dividends have increased and indexed products are near all-time highs.
> 
> Kinda sucks actually, I want to buy stocks cheap.


Haha,I agree. Prices need to tank and housing too!


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## dBII (Mar 12, 2013)

I really wish I was savvy enough to know what/when/why to invest...I've never had much luck and while my portfolio is up about 10% overall, that is such an exception for me. I'm reasonably certain that anything I have in my portfolio is money I've put there myself as opposed to interest earned. Rather a depressing thought frankly.


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## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

dBII said:


> I really wish I was savvy enough to know what/when/why to invest...I've never had much luck and while my portfolio is up about 10% overall, that is such an exception for me. I'm reasonably certain that anything I have in my portfolio is money I've put there myself as opposed to interest earned. Rather a depressing thought frankly.


What you need is an Asset Allocation and Re-balancing strategy. If you invest in as little as 4 broad market ETFs, you can have essentially the entire global equity market and Canadian bond market. Invest regularly via Dollar Cost Averaging and keep your Asset Allocation within 5-10 percentage points of your written strategy with annual re-balancing. Over a longer period of time (>5 years rolling average), making money is almost a certainty. There is no need to be a stock jock which often translates to bragging rights at parties, in internet forums or around the office coffee station.


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## dBII (Mar 12, 2013)

I have done a fair bit of reading here and your summary of advice is something I need to put in to practice. Over the years I have lost a lot of faith in my investment skills and the markets in general. Investment counselors have come and gone and never given me the advice that you summarized in one short paragraph.


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## marina628 (Dec 14, 2010)

I am + 10.13% on registered and + 13.3% on non registered.


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## birdman (Feb 12, 2013)

I am embarrassed to say that I am up a measly 5.5% on my stock portfolio and of course my fixed income is significantly less than that. Got beat up pretty good on Fortis, Transcanada Pipe, and Gibson energy. Also, I don't hold any oil stocks at the present.


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## doctrine (Sep 30, 2011)

I did some rough calculations and my investments are up about 21% year to date, not including savings/tax refund. Net worth up 36% this year when savings are included. I have a few big winners though, I made nearly $30k on just two stocks, Automodular and Autocanada. I have some tax hits on Automodular that will take $5k out of those next year.


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## daddybigbucks (Jan 30, 2011)

TSX is up 2.5%
my rrsp is up 4.8% (low risk)
kids RESP is up 4.7% (low risk)
and TFSA is up 45% -today's buyout of ANS helped there (medium/high risk)

can't complain.


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## Jon_Snow (May 20, 2009)

Probably up around 5% between all of our various accounts (wife's and I). Now the real kicker is that my portfolio is yielding around 6.5% - early retirement income stream is shaping up nicely - over $3000 monthly in divy's right now. :encouragement:


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## Spidey (May 11, 2009)

It depends on which month you ask. Generally have a ROR fluctuating in the high single digits in my entire portfolio which includes cash, bonds and equities. Most recent annual return at the end of August is 7.15%.


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## Jungle (Feb 17, 2010)

Jungle said:


> I did a XIRR on all our portfolios last weekend? Can't recall, but it was up 11%, assuming it's Dec 31.
> 
> One TFSA doing poor, it included Rogers, IPL.UN and CU, all three have been hit hard.
> 
> Basic couch potatos are doing well this year too.


+10.29 % YTD now. 4 months left to go.


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## jcgd (Oct 30, 2011)

YTD is 14.38% on my RRSP from my XIRR calculation. I'm happy with this number so far.


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## stephenheath (Apr 3, 2009)

Only up about 4.3% this year to the end of August... should be able to make my 6% target by the end of the year.


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## blin10 (Jun 27, 2011)

up about 7% this year, but if not for the dividends i'd be pretty much flat


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

@JonSnow, "...over $3000 monthly in divy's right now." Awesome. My retirement goal is $30 k per year (not including RRSPs and pensions). Almost 25% way there.

You're killing it :encouragement:


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## Jon_Snow (May 20, 2009)

Thanks MOA... Building up a dependable income stream is more important than stock appreciation for me, though the latter is always appreciated.


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## blin10 (Jun 27, 2011)

what a day, with pot and ipl going crazy today it moves my yield to 11% so far this year.... but im sure it'll go down lol


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## MrMatt (Dec 21, 2011)

blin10 said:


> what a day, with pot and ipl going crazy today it moves my yield to 11% so far this year.... but im sure it'll go down lol


I'm at about +20%, nicely beats the TSX or S&P 500.


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## jcgd (Oct 30, 2011)

If I calculate XIRR from the starting balance on Jan.1/2013 to today, is the result my return to date, or my return on Dec.31/2013 if the return continues at the same rate? I'm not sure if I'm phrasing that correctly.

Some people say that if they make 10% in a month than they are making an annualized return of 120%. Does XIRR do this (which I think is absurd) or does XIRR calculate the return between the dates I provide only?


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## GoldStone (Mar 6, 2011)

jcgd said:


> If I calculate XIRR from the starting balance on Jan.1/2013 to today, is the result my return to date, or my return on Dec.31/2013 if the return continues at the same rate?


The latter. It calculates annualized return.

To find your return to date, set the end date to Dec 31. That is equivalent to zero further growth in the remainder of the year.


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## jcgd (Oct 30, 2011)

Ack, I guess I accidentally goosed my reported return. I'll fix those posts. Thanks for the clarification.


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## My Own Advisor (Sep 24, 2012)

Nice to see, re: IPL 

"CALGARY, ALBERTA--(Marketwired - Sept. 9, 2013) - Inter Pipeline Ltd. ("Inter Pipeline") (TSX:IPL) announced today that its board of directors has approved a 13% increase to its monthly cash dividends from $0.095 to $0.1075 per share commencing with its September 2013 dividend payable in October 2013. On an annualized basis, dividends will increase from $1.14 to $1.29 per share.

Shareholders of record as of September 23rd, 2013 will be eligible for Inter Pipeline's new monthly dividend rate of $0.1075 per share, with initial payment expected on or about October 15th, 2013."

http://web.tmxmoney.com/article.php?newsid=62554658&qm_symbol=IPL


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