Canadians: what is your exposure to global equities.

[MMMdude]

I have slowly been trying to go from my 0% world ex Canada equity exposure 5 years ago to something more along 50/50 between Canada and the rest of the world.  I feel 50% is still reasonable for Canandian exposure given we spend our money here so it is reasonable to have home bias in addition to the juicy dividend tax credit.

My reasoning I guess to skew towards Canada in earlier years was my focus on building a base dividend income to cover my base expenses.  At 36K per year in dividends I feel i've done that and can take more of a global approach.  And with the div tax credit it is basically tax free assuming no other income upon retirement.  It's hard turning down some of these juicy yields in Canada which tells me we are undervalued relative to US equities.  Things like Telus, Rogers, many utilities, the banks and pipelines have divy's in the 4 - 7%.

Anyways I digress...of your equity  only portion of your portfolio what kind of split do you have and why?

[RichMoose]

I'm 100% global stocks ex-Canada. I feel Canada is a tiny market that is concentrated into a few sectors and I am not very concerned with divvy tax credits at this point. I'm aiming for growth and am happy with capital gains.

[Retire-Canada]

My current AA is:

- CDN stocks = 25%
- US stocks = 50%
- Int'l Dev = 12%
- Int'l EM = 13%

I'm thinking of shifting another 5% lower on CDN and bumping up the two Int'l ETFs to 15% each. Given my CDN real estate and my anticipation of CPP/OAS I am heavily home biased even when I get to 20% CDN stocks.

My Non-Registered account is 100% CDN stocks, but that's just a small portion of my investments.

[anisotropy]

30% CDN
30% USA
30% Int'l Dev + EM (mostly Dev, EM accounts for maybe 4% if that)
10% Bond... Ya I have bonds lol, who still holds bonds, measly 2% a year.

so roughly 33% if you consider equity only. Generally I agree, CDN has been like a pig since 2011. But home bias is real, for practical reasons along with hoping for a commodity boom.

[MikeK00]

I used to think i needed exposure to Canada but i 100% agree with the post above, Canada is pretty small, GDP is in between south Korea and Brazil and focused in only 2 sectors.
Another way to look at it is, you live in Canada, your main currency exposure is CAD, therefor you are already "invested" in Canada.

[sieben]

22.5% CDN
43% USA
27% INTL
7.5% EMERG

Canada is a small market, and I'd be fine holding a bit less in Canadian but since I'm holding a fair bit in taxable accounts the fact it's a bit more tax efficient helps me leave it where it's at.

[Frugancial Advisor]

Canada is around 3% of global market cap, and is heavily weighted in financials and energy. In addition, a significant portion of revenue produced in Canada is via US companies (i.e. Apple, Facebook, etc.).

Although the dividend yields may seem appealing, chasing yield is one of the biggest concerns in Canadian markets right now as investors who have shunned low-yielding bonds have bought up telecom and financial companies strictly for their yield.

The dividend tax credit could be changed at any time, especially worrisome considering Morneau is still in office (look what's happened to corporate taxes as an example).

Lastly, there are products which are great for non-registered accounts as they use total return swap strategies to effectively create only capital gains upon selling (which is a huge benefit for planning purposes) while providing exposure to non-Canadian markets.

[emense]

100% VT

I'll let the markets decide my exposure to Canada. I'm pretty hands off.

[Le Barbu]

30% Canada
35% US
35% Int’l

[Le Barbu]

30% Canada
35% US
35% Int’l

My goal is to get Canada down to 25% over time but taxes considerations keep me from doing it to fast.

[anisotropy]

Brought back memories from when I was getting a clearance. One of my interviewers suggested it was unpatriotic to be "underweight" Canadian equities at 30%. I was like, dude, good thing you are getting a defined pension.

[JAYSLOL]

34% Can
33% USA
33% other international

Personally I wouldn't go any more than 1/3 Can stocks, the market is just too small and returns have been sub-par when compared to US