No offense but a few comments that you made got me stumped (which isn't hard to do btw):
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/...16-countries-canada-flunks-for-high-fees.aspx
In general, a 2.5% MER fund (which is the average expense ratio) will take off half of your investment results every 3.5 decades. In other words, if you started investing at the age of 30 and were supposed to retire at the age of 65 with $1M, if you had invested in a 2.5% MER fund (there are many many Canadian funds that have far higher fees) you would only have $500,000 (or less).
You can think of this in the opposite manner - if you are retired after investing in a 2.5% MER fund in your 30s, whatever you end up with should have been double what it is. Thus, if you are standing at $500,000 at retirement, you should have had $1M.
Half my retirement take is too much to pay for any advisor. This is why my wife and I do not use financial planners - we would rather keep the $500,000.
From the aforementioned article,
"Canada got a failing grade of F for its high fees, as Morningstar Canada reported on its web site here. On fees, Canada finished dead last, corroborating an earlier academic study by Harvard's Peter Tufano and two other finance professors. Morningstar found that Canada and Japan were the only countries in which the median MER for equity funds generally ranged between 2% and 2.5%. "We encourage fund companies in Canada and Japan to lower their fees and expenses for the benefit of the investors," Morningstar wrote."
However there it hope as it goes on to say,
"As I've pointed out before, it's very easy for Canadians to build portfolios for well under 0.5% annually all-in."
Don't hold your breath if you're waiting for your financial planner to put you into these low-cost options.
In addition, the vast (and I mean vast) majority of Canadians have no idea what the fees are on all of their funds. They can tell you how much they saved buying chicken on special, but they have no idea how many hundreds or thousands of dollars they've lost to fees on all their funds (but at least they had an inexpensive chicken dinner...)
My wife and I find it amusing that financial planners tell us to plan for retirement by investing in their funds - what they neglect to tell us is that it is *their* retirement that we're paying for! LOL
In Canada, an individual who has been placed into a mutual fund by an advisor should expect their returns to be slightly better than a savings account; and this is no exaggeration.
If you do not understand interpreting financial statements (and or making informed decisions) how can you determine if the "fundamentals are still valid"?
Canadian mutual funds are well known throughout the world as being the highest fees and, consequently a horrible 'investment'.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/...16-countries-canada-flunks-for-high-fees.aspx
In general, a 2.5% MER fund (which is the average expense ratio) will take off half of your investment results every 3.5 decades. In other words, if you started investing at the age of 30 and were supposed to retire at the age of 65 with $1M, if you had invested in a 2.5% MER fund (there are many many Canadian funds that have far higher fees) you would only have $500,000 (or less).
You can think of this in the opposite manner - if you are retired after investing in a 2.5% MER fund in your 30s, whatever you end up with should have been double what it is. Thus, if you are standing at $500,000 at retirement, you should have had $1M.
Half my retirement take is too much to pay for any advisor. This is why my wife and I do not use financial planners - we would rather keep the $500,000.
From the aforementioned article,
"Canada got a failing grade of F for its high fees, as Morningstar Canada reported on its web site here. On fees, Canada finished dead last, corroborating an earlier academic study by Harvard's Peter Tufano and two other finance professors. Morningstar found that Canada and Japan were the only countries in which the median MER for equity funds generally ranged between 2% and 2.5%. "We encourage fund companies in Canada and Japan to lower their fees and expenses for the benefit of the investors," Morningstar wrote."
However there it hope as it goes on to say,
"As I've pointed out before, it's very easy for Canadians to build portfolios for well under 0.5% annually all-in."
Don't hold your breath if you're waiting for your financial planner to put you into these low-cost options.
In addition, the vast (and I mean vast) majority of Canadians have no idea what the fees are on all of their funds. They can tell you how much they saved buying chicken on special, but they have no idea how many hundreds or thousands of dollars they've lost to fees on all their funds (but at least they had an inexpensive chicken dinner...)
My wife and I find it amusing that financial planners tell us to plan for retirement by investing in their funds - what they neglect to tell us is that it is *their* retirement that we're paying for! LOL
In Canada, an individual who has been placed into a mutual fund by an advisor should expect their returns to be slightly better than a savings account; and this is no exaggeration.