A Saskatchewan farm couple sells their farm and expects to live on easy street. But high taxes and poor fund performance lead them down a different road
In a corner of Saskatchewan, a couple we’ll call Jack and Roberta, both 48, were having trouble making their 1,000 acre grain farm pay. It was 2007 and an offer was on the table for $900,000. They had jobs in town paying them a total of $90,000 per year, so they decided to sell. Today, […] Read moreGoing broke on a small fortune
Judge a stock’s worth by its risk
Volatile stocks tend to bring higher returns. But not everyone has the stomach to hold an unstable portfolio
There are good reasons to be cynical about investing in stocks or mutual funds, or exchange traded funds that hold stocks. Investing is about buying low and selling high. But just what is low and what, precisely, is high is usually clouded in uncertainty. To a cynic, the idea of judging companies’ values by their […] Read moreUnwinding a farm corporation
Frank, now 62, and his wife, who we’ll call Elora, bought their southern Manitoba farm 32 years ago. By the time Frank’s brother Bob joined the operation 20 years ago, Frank and Elora had 1,280 ares of personally owned land. Frank and Bob incorporated the farm in 1981, bought 640 more acres of land and […] Read more
How to profit from off-farm investments
The first rule of investing money is “don’t lose it.” In stock, bond and commodity markets in which most trading is controlled by institutions and professional investors, the little guy with $10,000 in his fist is the last to get the news, the slowest to trade on it, and the most likely to pay the […] Read more
Investing against the odds
It is a custom in the press to spend the first part of a new year predicting what will happen in the remainder of the year. Keeping the custom, I am going to do it, at considerable risk to my reputation as a conservative, reasonably trustworthy guy. What to do? At the moment, we are […] Read more
Selling the farm
A couple we’ll call Jack (55) and Susie (60) have farmed in western Manitoba for most of their lives. They have 640 acres in their own names and farm 2,360 acres their parents owned or that they have rented. When Jack’s father died 10 years ago, the farm was in jeopardy. Dad had not updated his will for 20 years. The document was basic. His wife would receive everything and […] Read more
Momentum investing
Financial prophecies have lives of their own and, much of the time, they are dead wrong. Read the financial press and with every runup of price of some asset, there are stories saying that zooming prices of gold, potash, various hot stocks and even some junk bonds are only the beginning. With a little numerology, […] Read more
Guarding Wealth: Canadian bonds hold up as European bonds tumble
Read any major newspaper and you’ll find a plethora of worrisome stories: European bond yields hitting new highs as banks and others sell off their Greek, Portuguese, Dutch, Spanish and Italian bonds; the decline of the value of the Euro against other currencies; and stocks tumbling on either side of the Atlantic. You could be […] Read more
Life Insurance Decisions In The Face Of Tax And Estate Planning
In Alberta, a farmer we ll call Bill has been a grain producer for 57 years. His wife, who we ll call Elizabeth, passed away not long ago, leaving Bill, now 84, to manage 5,000 acres of land. He has two children, a daughter, 44, and a son, 42, both of whom have built lives […] Read more
Be Safe, Not Sorry With Investments
For investors, the summer of 2011 was tough. The S&P/TSX Composite Index was off 20 per cent, as I write, and the world is hanging by its virtual fingernails onto news from Europe will Greece default on its national bonds, will other countries fall, and will European banks go bust? The scenario reads like something […] Read more
Cyber-Savvy Farmer
