Topic: How To Invest

Q: Pat, when balancing economic sectors in my portfolio, where do I assign these two ETFs that you recommend as buys: XDV and SPY? Thank you.

Article Excerpt

A: Both of these ETFs hold stocks in most or all of the five main economic sectors: Finance, Utilities, Resources, Consumer and Manufacturing. The iShares Canadian Select Dividend Index ETF, $24.28, symbol XDV on Toronto (Units outstanding: 57.1 million; Market cap: $1.4 billion; www.blackrock.com/ca), holds 30 of the highest-yielding Canadian stocks. The ETF’s rough breakdown by sector is Finance, 57%; Utilities, 27%; Resources, 12%; and Manufacturing 4%. (It has no Consumer stocks.) If you have 10% of your portfolio in this ETF, you could break it down to a significant 5.7% in Finance; a noteworthy 2.7% in Utilities; a marginal 1.2% in Resources; and a not-worth-mentioning 0.4% in Manufacturing. The SPDR S&P 500 ETF, $281.12, symbol SPY on New York (Units outstanding: 938.0 million; Market cap: $263.7 billion; us.spdrs.com), holds the stocks in the S&P 500 Index, which is made up of 500 major U.S. companies selected by industry group, market size and liquidity. This ETF’s breakdown by sector is roughly Manufacturing, 48%; Consumer, 17%;…