Weekend Reading: 2015 Farewell Edition

With the year quickly winding down I wanted to publish one final edition of weekend reading before we break for the holidays. Expect to see new articles published here on Monday and Wednesday for each of the next two weeks before we get back to our regular posting schedule in the new year. In the meantime, thanks for reading and…

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Weekend Reading: Clarifying New Rules Edition

The new federal government has proposed changes that will affect your personal finances next year. This edition of weekend reading looks to explain these changes and how they might impact your wallet. Let’s get to it: Minimum Down Payment Increase This week the Liberals introduced changes for minimum down payments on a home purchase. The new rules,…

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Weekend Reading: Financial Literacy Edition

November was financial literacy month but you wouldn’t know it from any specifically promoted ‘literacy’ articles on this blog. I take issue with the way banks and investment firms try to shoe-horn their way into the financial literacy curriculum when a good portion of the content should be about educating Canadians on how to become savvy…

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Weekend Reading: FinTech Edition

There’s a disruptive shift happening in the financial industry where nimble technology start-ups are moving in on traditional bank-dominated services such as lending, investing, payments and retail transactions, and everyday banking. Dubbed FinTech, this financial technology renaissance is quickly moving from alternative to mainstream and is something to watch in 2016 and beyond. We’ve already seen…

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Weekend Reading: SPIVA Edition

The SPIVA Canada Scorecard looks at the performance of actively managed Canadian mutual funds versus that of their benchmarks. The results over the long-term show that the majority of active managers underperform their benchmarks. And it’s not even close. Here are the biggest losers: Canadian Dividend & Income Equity Funds – Only 6.67% of the active Canadian…

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Weekend Reading: Problems With Trailer Fees Edition

The Canadian Securities Administration wants to reform the mutual fund fee structure in Canada and earlier this year awarded two studies to review whether commission-based compensation changes the nature of advice and influences mutual fund sales. The first report was prepared by the Brondesbury Group made it clear that commission-based advice creates problems that need to be…

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Weekend Reading: Happy Thanksgiving Edition

This week Tangerine unveiled details of its long-awaited first credit card; the Tangerine Money-back card. Expected to launch in early 2016, this no-fee MasterCard will offer 2 percent cash back in two spending categories of your choice, and the option to have your cash-back deposited into a Tangerine Savings Account to unlock an additional 2 percent category.…

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Weekend Reading: Succession Planning Edition

Earlier this week, Million Dollar Journey blogger Frugal Trader wrote a letter to his wife explaining how their finances work in case he passes away and she needs to succeed him as the household CFO. It’s an interesting topic, and one that former Boomer & Echo correspondent Sandi Martin covered here last year. Although his wife has little-to-no…

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Weekend Reading: Flash Boys Giveaway Edition

Michael Lewis is one of my favourite financial authors. He has a unique blend of on-the-ground experience (he was a bond trader on Wall Street before resigning to write Liar’s Poker), plus the talent and ability to turn a complex story into a compelling narrative. His best work, in my opinion, was The Big Short, which…

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Weekend Reading: Let’s Get Blunt Edition

Earlier this week Marie reviewed a new book by Mark Goodfield called, Let’s Get Blunt About Your Financial Affairs. We received an overwhelming number of responses to the book review and giveaway. In total, we had 121 entries vying for the chance to win one of three copies of the book. We used a random number…

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