How to Build an ETF Portfolio at Questrade | DIY Investing with Justin Bender - YouTube

Channel: Justin & Shannon Bender

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Hi, I’m Justin Bender, Portfolio Manager at PWL Capital in
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Toronto, and this is episode seven of my DIY Investing Series.
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Today’s lesson is on How to Build an ETF portfolio at Questrade.
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For our example, we’ll be purchasing the five ETFs from my 40% fixed income / 60% equity
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model portfolio -please feel free to download
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the model portfolios from my blog before getting started.
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After reviewing our account information, we find that there’s $5,000 of
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cash available for investment within the RRSP account.
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We’ll begin by ensuring that we’re in the Stocks, Options, ETFs’ section of the
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trading screen.
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Next, we’ll enter VCN in the order entry field, clicking on the fund name when it appears.
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This will generate a quote directly below the stock ticker.
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When we’re buying an ETF, we’ll be focusing on the Ask price, which is the price per share
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that an investor is willing to sell the ETF to us for.
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To calculate the number of shares that we need to purchase, we’ll use our computer’s
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calculator: Multiplying the total account value of $5,000
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by VCN’s target allocation of 20% (or 0.2), gives us $1,000.
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We can then divide this value by the current ask price of the ETF, which is $31.23 in our
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example.
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This equals 32 shares (we can just round down to the nearest whole share).
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Let’s go ahead and enter 32 in the Quantity field.
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For the order type, I prefer to select Limit’s, as this puts a cap on how
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much we’re willing to pay for the ETF.
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In the Limit Price field, enter an amount that’s a couple cents higher than the current ask price.
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Even if you use a higher limit price to place your trade, you’ll still receive the lower
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ask price if it’s available.
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The Duration should be set to 'Day', which means that your order will
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expire by the end of the trading day if it goes unfilled. You should also
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ensure that you’re trading in the correct account, which is the RRSP
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account in our example.
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We can then click on ‘Buy’ to review our trade details.You may notice a commission
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of 0.112 dollars has been applied for this trade.
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Questrade charges electronic communication network fees, or ECN fees for short, for trades
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that are expected to be filled immediately.
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Their ECN fee is 0.0035 dollars per share.
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If we multiply the 0.0035 dollar ECN fee by our 32 shares, it
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equals the 0.112 dollars in commissions.
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Once you’ve reviewed the order details, and verified that the total trade cost plus
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commissions is approximately the dollar amount that you’d like to purchase, you can click
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on Send Order.
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When your order has been filled, you’ll receive a confirmation in the
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bottom right-hand corner of the screen.
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For the next trade, we’ll enter VUN as our symbol, clicking
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on the fund name when it appears.
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We’ll multiply our total account value of $5,000 by 20%, and
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divide this value by the current ask price of $41.75, which equals 23 shares.
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We can then enter 23 in the Quantity field.
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We’ll enter a limit price that’s a couple cents above the current ask price, and then
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click on 'Buy' and after confirming the trade details,
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we’ll click on 'Send Order.'
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For the next trade, we’ll enter XEF as our symbol, clicking on the fund name when it appears.
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We’ll multiply our total account value of $5,000 by 16%, and divide this value by the
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current ask price of $26.65, which equals 30 shares.
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We can then enter 30 in the Quantity field.
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We’ll enter a limit price that’s a couple cents above the current ask price, and then
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click on 'Buy' and after confirming the trade details, we’ll click on 'Send Order.'
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For the next trade we’ll enter XEC as our symbol, clicking on
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the fund name when it appears.
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We’ll multiply our total account value of $5,000 by 4%, and divide this value by the
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current ask price of $22.69, which equals 8 shares.
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We can then enter 8 in the Quantity field.
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We’ll enter a limit price that’s a couple cents above the current ask price, and then
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click on 'Buy.'
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And after confirming the trade details, we’ll click on 'Send Order.'
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For our final trade, we’ll try to use up as much of the remaining cash as possible
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– there is currently $2,058.66 available.
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We’ll enter VAB as our symbol, clicking on the fund name when
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it appears.
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We’ll divide our remaining cash of $2,058.66 by the current ask price of $25.51,
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which equals 80 shares.
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We can then enter 80 in the Quantity field.
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This time, we’ll enter a limit price directly at the current
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ask price in order to use up most of the available cash.
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We can then click on 'Buy.'
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And after confirming the trade details, we’ll click on 'Send Order.'
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If you’d like to review your new portfolio holdings, click
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on the Positions tab near the top left of the screen.
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Here we’ll find that we now have about $1,000 of our portfolio in Canadian stocks, $1,000
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in US stocks, $800 in international stocks, $200 in emerging markets stocks, and $2,000
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in Canadian bonds.
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If you have any questions, please feel free to send them to me by email: [email protected]