Once again North American stocks continue to impress. My liquid net worth (net financial assets) climbed 2.5% over the course of November, nearly $8,000 of gain on its own. Many people including myself thought a Donald Trump win for the presidency would trigger a stock market correction. Although the Dow Jones fell 800 points (about 4%) in pre-market trading the morning after election day, it quickly recovered and went on to hit all time highs in subsequent days in mid November. And just yesterday, the Dow Jones, S&P and transports closed the day at record highs again, climbing more than 1%. What an amazing time to be an investor. 🙂 I feel euphoric! But this is also a time to be diligent because bull markets tend to last 6 to 8 years historically speaking, and we’ve been in this current bull market for 8 years now. Uh oh.
Stock valuations certainly appear to be stretched at this time. The fact that investor’s margin debt is near record highs also concerns me because over-leverage has lead to stock market drops and economic recessions in the past. Investing in the stock market is like toilet paper; sometimes you’re on a roll, but other times you can find yourself in a crappy situation like the crash of 2008. 😄 Nobody can know for sure when the market will peak again, but I decided to take a break from buying stocks in November and paid down some debt. I also contributed $4,000 to my retirement account (RRSP) to buy some Baytex Energy bonds. Overall it was a great month. I hope everyone else enjoyed it as well. 😀
Liquid’s Financial Update
*Side Incomes:
- Part-Time = $700
- Freelance = $800
- Dividends = $500
- Interest = $200
- Fun = $200
- Debt Interest = $1200
*Net Worth: (MoM)
- Assets: = $1,037,800 total (+8,300)
- Cash = $19,500 (-4000)
- Stocks CAD =$130,100 (+4200)
- Stocks US = $80,200 (+3800)
- RRSP = $75,300 (+4300)
- Mortgage Funds = $26,700
- SolarShare Bonds = $10,000
- Home = $263,000
- Farms = $433,000
- Debts: = $482,100 total (-2,800)
- Mortgage = $186,000 (-400)
- Farm Loans = $192,400 (-500)
- Margin Loans = $59,300 (-700)
- TD Line of Credit = $17,500 (-1200)
- CIBC Line of Credit = $9,500
- HELOC = $17,400
*November Total Net Worth = $555,700 (+$11,100 / +2.04%)
All numbers above are in $CDN. Conversion rate used: 1.00 CAD = 0.75 USD
I was waiting on a cash refund from a financial institution before investing in any more stocks. The cash was finally returned earlier this week so my plan for December is to purchase 5 figures worth of stocks in Great Britain to take advantage of the low Pound Sterling currency. 🙂 This is exciting because it probably means I’ll be adding another line item to my asset column next month.
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Random Useless Fact:
Yeah, things are definitely in the euphoria stage right now. The really scary part is there are SO many people out there saying “This time it’s different”
Which I’m sure is the same thing people have said every other time.
Those people should learn from history. Things are always good, until they’re not. 🙂
Sell when people are Greedy!! Just saying.. It’s a great time to look at positions and maybe take some profits if you’re into that sort of thing.. We are pushing some pretty high P/E numbers.
Many people will probably do that, especially nearing the end of the year to take advantage of tax-loss selling. One question I would consider is what to do with the profits after taking money out of the markets? Holding it in a savings account is one option, but maybe there are better alternatives.
Pretty solid month! I’m expecting to see some decent gains in my stocks at the end of the year but my biggest property is in Alberta and it’s well less than stellar.
It’s been a tough year for Alberta’s economy. Maybe oil prices will be higher next year.
Long time follower, first time commentor.
Could you tell us what stocks your looking at in Great Britain. Also, how you went about purchasing the Baytex bonds?
Hi Anil. Thanks for commenting.
I’m looking to purchase the FTSE All-Share index, which represents over 98% of all the stocks in the U.K. by market cap. It’s basically an aggregation of the FTSE 100, FTSE 250, and FTSE SmallCap indexes. The only ETF I could find that tracks the broad U.K. market is the SPDR FTSE UK All Share (FTAL) so I will probably buy that in my Interactive Brokers account.
I purchased Baytex bonds by looking at a bond table found on TD’s webbroker site and then calling them to order the bond purchase. My post tomorrow will go into full details.
Welcome to the Millionaire club! LOL 🙂 Even if your net worth isn’t $1M now, but after 22-25 more years or so if you leave everything the same and only spend the interests, you’d be a millionaire. LOL 🙂 Leverage is King! LOL 🙂
Well with networth of $500K, average return 10%, in 7 years it will swell to $1M