| Financial
Forum Quick Tour |
Dateline: 03/02/98
The fifth annual Vancouver Financial Forum ran from February 13 to February 15 this year. Similar forums took place in Montreal and Toronto at the beginning of the month. I had not attended one previously and decided to check out this year's, if for no other reason than to provide fodder for this article. It was actually more interesting than I expected and I wish I'd had more than the hour and a half I allotted to it. Maybe next year! Meanwhile, if you didn't get to go, here's my quick tour of what you missed.
"Ladies and gentlemen, " the suavely dressed young man said in his polished speaking voice, "be sure to head for Ballroom B at 3:30 to learn the secrets of managing a $100,000 portfolio."
The speaker was Duff Young, author of Duff Young's Fund Monitor 1998. He's slick and smooth, rather young, and short. But he's long on knowledge about mutual funds. He had a display at the Financial Forum and was there personally selling his book and autographing them. The price, a bargain at $5. I had to get one, of course.
Duff was talking to someone else when I picked up the book from one of his assistants, who interrupted him briefly to get it autographed for me. As I was short on time, I didn't hang around to talk to him myself. Maybe next year.
Lectures by prominent financial writers, advisors, fund managers and other experts are just part of the annual Financial Forum. Headliners this year included Dr. Riley Moynes aka the Money Coach, Wealthy Barber author David Chilton, writers Joanne Thomas Yaccato, Jerry White and John Kaiser, and speakers from GLOBEfund, Dynamic Funds, Trimark, AIC, Templeton, Royal Mutual Funds, TD Asset Management, Altamira and more. Each of the three days featured simultaneous speakers in the three ballrooms and on the show floor at 9:30, 11:00, 12:30. 2:00, 3:30 and 5:00. Topics ranged from Duff Young's "Managing the $100,000 Portfolio" to Offshore Tax Planning, Understanding and Balancing Risk, Demographics, Global Investing and Rational Speculation.
As I walked into the Forum, I passed by the three ballrooms, each with a session in progress. I was amazed by the sparseness of the turnout. Each of the ballrooms could accommodate several hundred people. The busiest lecture had maybe 25. Another looked like it had about ten. I don't know if this was because I walked in at 3:00 PM on the last day of the event or whether attendance in general was sparse. But it was a surprise.
I was primarily interested in the "Trade Show" aspect of the Forum, so I headed past the ballrooms to the display floor.
The main display area of the Financial Forum is laid out like any other trade show, with tables and booths for merchants displaying their wares. Only the wares are different. No hot tubs like at the Home and Garden Show, No hawkers of handy slicers and dicers like at the PNE. Just financial stuff, which means the booths are generally a lot smaller and more compact than you find at other events. The wares are in the form of pamphlets, brochures, prospectuses, and magazines, with the occasional promotional item thrown in. The Bank of Montreal had a free pad of sticky notes and a letter opener in the shape of a 1.2 MB floppy disk, and several booths had retirement planning calculators.
The first booth inside the hall was Altamira. Mutual fund companies, in fact, were well represented here. I stopped by most of them to pick up a brochure or two and to talk briefly with the reps. Besides the big names - Altamira, Spectrum United, Templeton, Trimark, Fidelity, GT Global, Investors Group and the bank funds - many of the smaller and less well known funds were also represented. Since I'm fairly familiar with the big players, I spent more time checking out the others.
One of these was the very new Infinity Funds. Only just over a year old, the Infinity group follows a Warren Buffett style. And not coincidentally, an AIC Advantage style. AIC's managers are also Buffett-o-philes who discovered the wealth management niche long before anyone else did. Infinity has a Wealth Management Fund that holds many of the same investments as AIC Advantage and then some. Their International Fund holds shares in Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway as well as Buffett favorites Coca-Cola, Walt Disney, the Washington Post, Wells Fargo, Gillette and more. But unlike Buffett, who has shyed away from technology stocks, Infinity's International Fund also holds shares in Microsoft. Their Canadian Fund follows a similar pattern. It's paid off, though not as handsomely as the funds it is cloning. The Canadian and International Funds have one year returns respectively of 23.3% and 22.6%. I'll be watching them with interest.
Also participating at the Forum were Atlas, Scudder, University Avenue, NCE, Stone and Marathon. Formerly a one fund company with its exceptional Marathon Equity Fund, Marathon is now launching a new line of funds using what they call their exclusive SMART investment methodology. The method uses proprietary computer software to analyze the largest 300 Canadian and 500 American stocks to identify undervalued and overvalued issues. If it can match the performance of the Equity Fund, then investors should take note! As with the Marathon Equity Fund, a $5000 minimum investment is required.
Strategic Value had a display. This new fund group is the baby of Bonham and Company. Mark Bonham was the mastermind behind the growth of BPI Mutual Funds until he parted company in 1995. His flagship Strategic Value Fund has done extremely well but it is for wealthy investors only ($150,000 minimum). Recently Bonham took over the large but floundering Laurentian Funds, which have all been revitalized as Strategic Value Funds.
There were many investment publications represented at the Forum, all of them giving out free samples. Naturally the Financial Post was there, as was the venerable Investor's Digest. The latter is chock full of useful information, including a Summary of Analyst's Recommendations which runs every second issue. Investor's Digest also had their 1998 All Star Funds book for sale. Because it was near the end of the show and the fellow at the booth didn't want to cart a case of them back to Toronto, I was lucky enough to get one free! It is probably the most complete guide to mutual funds in Canada with 1700 funds listed.
Other publications displayed were Canadian Moneysaver, which had an excellent critique of David Cork's The Pig and the Python, and my favorite find of the Forum, IE:Money Magazine. This glossy mag is an entertaining and informative read. They were giving away the November issue and their annual Mutual Funds issue. Both contained a wealth of great reading..
Other participants in the Forum included the Investment Funds Institute of Canada , the Canadian Securities Institute, the Canadian Institute of Financial Planning and the Investor Learning Centre of Canada, all of whom offer courses on financial planning and investment. The B.C. Association of Financial Planners provided me with a directory of financial planners throughout the province. And many brokers and financial advisors had their own displays. There were also a couple of venture capital opportunities. One of the latter was Opus II Cranberries which I profiled here last year. Another was Empress Botanicals which invests in herbal medicine initiatives. Its initial investment is in Pure Ginseng Inc..
Fundata Canada and Southam New media, both of whom supply mutual fund daily quotes to newspapers, were at the Forum. Online companies with displays included GLOBEfund, E-Trade Canada and a new site called STOX., which is dedicated to the global venture capital market.
All in all, the Forum was well worth attending. Next year I'll go earlier and spend the whole day. The best thing about it is it introduces you to new publications and investment opportunities you might not otherwise be aware of. If you've never attended one, take note and try to attend next year.
For Mutual Fund companies mentioned check
my Mutual
Funds Net Links. Here are some
fund companies relatively new to the Net:
Trade Organizations
Investment Funds Institute of Canada
Canadian Institute of Financial Planning
Publications
Other Sites
Sterling Mutuals Inc. (Discount Brokers)
Disclaimer: As with all my columns here, I should re-iterate a precaution. I am not a professional financial advisor. I am a financial journalist and editorialist. The views in these columns are my personal opinions.
American Readers: Looking for a broker who can sell you Canadian stocks? One of my brokers is licensed to sell securities to Americans in 26 states. She works for Canaccord Capital which is an excellent company with a superb research department. They are particularly knowledgeable on resource issues. Send me a note if you want to get in touch with her.
Investing (Canada) Notes
You're invited to get my weekly emailed Newsletter in which I let you know what the upcoming article will be and of any significant changes and additions to this site.