Canadian Personal Finance Blog

Personal Finances and Consumer Concerns, essays, stories, examples and how to articles with a distinctly Canadian Point of View

Random Thoughts: Canada Week

Friday, July 3rd, 2009

With Canada Day (July 1st) falling on a Wednesday and the 4th of July falling on a Saturday it makes for odd holiday patterns for both Canada and the U.S.A., my guess would be a lot of folks in Canada are taking Thursday and Friday off and making for a Mega-Long weekend.

To my American brother(s) and sisters I wish you a Happy 4th!

In the Financial Blogosphere

In the blogs this week some very interesting views of important issues in Personal Finance and Investing:

Remember the Globe and Mail Best of the Money Blogs voting continues until Monday as well! Enjoy the Mega-Long weekend.

More on this topic (What's this?)
Canada Rises to the Top
Did You Say Dance?
The Oil Sands of Alberta Canada
Read more on Investing in Canada at Wikinvest

Eating Your Own Dog Food?

Tuesday, June 30th, 2009

Interesting turn of phrase I have seen used to mean a few different ideas in the software development world and in a few other places as well.

The Interpretation I got for this phrase from the person who sent me was:

Eating your own dog food

  1. Coined by a Microsoft manager, to use the products you develop in your office as your customers would (with the same software quality), to ensure you understand your product and understand your customers needs as well.

It seems to be an extension on the concept of “Practicing what your preech” or “Walk to the walk, don’t just talk the talk…”, but finding a company that actually uses their own product can be a good thing, I have found in my travels in the world of high tech.

Financially Eating Your Own Dog Food

Investing and Financial Institutions are a little harder to figure out if they “Eat their own dog food“, I think it would be amusing to find out that the CEO of my bank didn’t use the bank for his finances (if not very disconcerting).

I would be very interested to see if the following might be happening:

  • The President of the insurance company that espouses “Freedom 55″ actually uses that program him or herself? I kind of doubt that one, but I’ll gladly retract that statement if it is not true.
  • Does the CEO of BMO  use their “Mortgage Insurance” facility, or does he or she simply buy term insurance as others do? My guess is No, they don’t use that either (they may not have a Mortgage mind you either).
  • All those insurance sales folk who want to sell me “Whole Life” insurance, do they buy the product? My guess is some do, but maybe at a much cheaper rate than we do.
  • Does the President of TD use their Stepper GIC product? I think no is the answer on that one too.
  • Do the CEO’s of the Mutual Fund companies that have MER’s of 4 and 5%, buy their own mutual funds? My guess would be not likely.
  • Did Mr. Madoff buy into his own Ponzi scheme? Don’t answer that, it’s rhetorical, by the by, he got 150 years, given he is 72, he’ll be spending the rest of his life in prison (is that enough).

Any other examples of “Eating their dog food” in the financial world I have missed, please chime in the Comments section.

More on this topic (What's this?)
Stock Trading Software, How Does It Help You
Asset Allocation Backtesting Software
Some Disturbing Facts on Food
Read more on Food & Beverage, Computer Software at Wikinvest

How Dry I am?

Wednesday, June 24th, 2009

LCBO Strike?

With the LCBO employees about to go on strike, Ontarians have been buying booze like prohibition was about to break out (however the Beer stores will be open). The strike should make for a drier summer if it comes to pass, but again it is a question of the use of “casual” employees (i.e. employees that can’t work enough hours to qualify for benefits). Given this government run monopoly seems to be entrenching to prove a point, looks to be a dry summer in Ontario (well drier any how).

Not sure why folks in Ottawa are that excited, Gatineau is not that far away, and they even have sales for their liquor. Looks like sales at the SAQ is going to go up in Gatineau this summer.

No Nortel on TSX

Nortel delisted on Monday, and thus another sorry Canadian story ends with a whimper and not a bang. Nortel the company will not be back, as it was (it may return much like Mitel did, much smaller and weaker) but maybe that is a good thing. Hopefully the remaining employees will mostly keep their jobs, but for those who have had their pensions torn apart, their severance lost and their savings decimated, not much else can be said either.

Canada is Growing 33,592,686 Strong!

Stats Canada says that in the first quarter of 2009.

Canada’s population increased by 0.26% in the first quarter of 2009, the fastest first-quarter growth rate since 2001.

Cool! Ontario’s population is over 13,000,000 , which is also interested, but I am interested to see where these people moved into, large urban centers would be my guess.

More on this topic (What's this?)
Watching Paint Dry
The Liquidation of Nortel Begins
Definitions on dry bulk ship sizes
Read more on Coinmach Service, Nortel Networks at Wikinvest

More Folks on EI in April

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

Stats Canada published their monthly stats about the Employment Insurance rolls and surprisingly more folks are claiming EI again last month.

In April, 697,000 people received regular Employment Insurance benefits, up 18,600 from a month earlier. This 2.7% increase was the smallest in six months.

However, it is nice to see it is the smallest rise in 6 months.

The disheartening news is:

Since October 2008, the number of regular EI beneficiaries has risen by 39.3%, increasing in all provinces and territories, with the largest percentage growth in Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Ontario.

EI Claims still Increasing

EI Claims still Increasing

Given one of the election argument points in the fall will be making EI claims easier, these numbers are bound to increase if the Financial Apocalypse continues until then.

RDSP Here But Not There

We have been researching RDSPs, but have found a very interesting issue with the large banks, only BMO, RBC and CIBC offer some sort of plan (which vary widely in what is offered, whether it is just GIC’s, mutual funds or a complete open trading account). The RDSP was introduced in the 2007 budget, but it is interesting that the banks seem to be dragging their feet on this service (for now).

The rules around the RDSP are very interesting as well, but I will elaborate on that more, after we research a little more. The Canadian Capitalist has already written about RDSPs as well.

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