Weekend News and Blog Roundup – Inflation

Apple and Beats

The world’s largest company, Apple Inc, has purchased Beats Electronics for $3 billion. Beats by Dre is a popular brand of headphones that sells for $300 a pair. #veryprofitable. As an Apple shareholder I approve of this deal and hope to make lots of money from this strategic move 🙂 I hope consumers are ready to buy the most overpriced piece of commodity gadget made in China ever!

April Inflation

The cost of living increased 2%, which is the highest it’s been in recent history. Gasoline, natural gas, shelter, and food have all become more expensive. This is great news for investors! I own many shares of Suncor and Encana, which are oil and gas companies. They are both listed in my Hedge Fund page for disclosure. The price of gasoline at the pumps is up 6.6% since April of last year, but my Suncor stock is up 30%! Encana’s share price is up 25%! Real estate prices are also up.

Inflation is good for those who own the right assets. So we have to invest in order to profit from this trend. Don’t wait for a good time to buy investments. Just buy them first, then wait for your investments to go up 😉

Lower Mortgage Rates

Scotiabank has lowered its 5 year fixed mortgage rate to just 2.97%. This is great news! As a Bank of Nova Scotia shareholder I applaud the company’s decision to attract home buyers when interest rates are low, so it can most likely increase the rate 5 years later when all these mortgages are up for renewal. If you’re a home owner in Canada with a mortgage, investing in bank stocks is a terrific way to hedge your interest rate risk. Once Scotiabank builds up relationships with new clients, it can also cross-sell them other financial products and services.

MIC Update

Earlier this month I blogged about doing some research into mortgage investment corporations or (MICs.) I called up several companies and did some due diligence. In the end I decided to go with a MIC based right here in British Columbia 🙂 Since MICs are exempt market products they are not scrutinized by regulators in the way that mutual funds are. So if a MIC goes terribly wrong the investors are pretty much SOL 😕 To protect itself the MIC made me sign a disclosure form as part of the application process. Click on image below to biggify.

One month ago I had never even heard of this company, but earlier this week I mailed them all the signed papers plus a personal cheque for $10,000! 😯 They seem to be a legitimate company according to their website, and the lady on the phone sounded nice, so I decided to trust them.

I guess I’m either really gullible and foolish, or a brilliant investor with a keen eye for superior market returns (^_-) Which is it going to be? I guess we shall see 😉

Later on I plan to write a more in depth article about my MIC purchase, the expected returns, and my buying process. Speaking of MICs, Financial Underdog from Money Ramblings wrote a detailed article explaining how MICs work, and his experience investing in a MIC based out of Alberta.

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Blog roundup – Below are some finance and other articles from around the web this week.

• Gen Wise Wealth write about the choice among wealth, luxury, and freedom.
• Modest Money has some thrifty driving tips
• Unique Gifter has practical gift ideas for recent grads
• Finance Journey bought a house!
• Roadmap 2 Retire also bought a house!
• Save Spend Splurge asks where you would live if money was no object