My Canadian Stocks
Now that I've selected my Canadian stocks, it was time on Friday to "buy" them. I selected the price at noon EST for each stock, and bought as many shares as I could without going over my $5,000 per stock limit.
The number of shares and total cost are (including a $29 commission on each trade):
Symbol Name Shares Price Total Cost
Per Share (incl. Comm.)
BVF.TO Biovail 271 18.3 $4,988.30
CTR-NV.TO Canadian Tire 84 58.85 $4,972.40
FHR.TO Fairmont Hotels121 40.75 $4,959.75
NRD.TO Noranda 203 24.39 $4,980.17
RY.TO Royal Bank 67 73.37 $4,944.79
T.TO Telus 129 38.3 $4,969.70
Total: $29,815.11
For my "index" I chose the Barclays IUnits shares tracking the S&P/TSX 60 index, ticker symbol XIU.TO. On Friday at noon I picked up 553.234 shares at $53.62 which, when added to my single $29 commission, added up exactly to my $29,815.11 initial cost on my six stock "random" portfolio.
I bought fractional IUnits shares for the purposes of this illustration only, since it's impossible to buy a fractional share.
Now we sit back and wait.
My purpose in doing this exercise is to show that "stock picking" is futile. Obviously, this one test won't definitively prove it, but I simply want to show that these six are as "good" as any other six. I know it sounds like investing defeatism, but it's sadly true.
I "bought" the US portion of the Buffoonery Portfolio the other day. It happened to be at the beginning of the recent slide in stock prices. However, the theory that I'm testing is that it doesn't really matter which stocks you pick - you're as ... Read
Having already selected the Canadian side of my portfolio, I'm now going to pick my U.S. stocks. I decided to select six stocks from the S&P 500 in a random fashion and test their performance against the index as a whole. The six stocks that ... Read
The Buffoonery Portfolio is underway in its quest to beat the S&P/TSX 60 index through the random selection of six stocks from the S&P/TSX 60 index. On the Canadian side, my six randomly-selected stocks are (drum roll please): BVF Biovail Corporation (bvf.to) CTR.NV Canadian Tire ... Read
For all those out there who are real "stock pickers", confident in your ability to beat the overall market index like a drum, I'm starting my own stock selection process. I'm going to start tracking a new index - the Buffoonery Portfolio (**note to buffoons ... Read
,
