OnĀ The Australian Investors PodcastĀ ā2 Senseā this week, investment analyst Owen RaskĀ and financial plannerĀ Drew Meredith, CFP dive into what exactly the Washington H. Soul Pattinson & Co. Ltd’s (ASX: SOL) competitive advantage really is, whether a financial adviser is worth it, writing options contracts for extra income and so much more.
The Australian Investors Podcast, Australiaās best investing podcast for professionals and private investors, is back for ā2 senseā, hosted by investment analyst Owen Rask and financial planner Drew Meredith, CFP (AKA Andrew Deremith). Join 58,000 investors who listen regularly.
This weekās winner of our ābest questioner nameā is Rask me once, Shame on Drew, Motley fool email me twice shame on mer, who asked about ETF holdings.
Here are some of the investing questions we attempted to cover
| I have two sons, both boys | If you are financial literate, and don’t mind the extra abit of work going into understanding how an etf fund work, whats the downside to DIY ETF fund. i.e. create your own etf fund. The premise here is that you can save on the fees if you do the work on your own, and also learn more about the market. |
| This Guy | What low cost brokers can I use to invest in AMD or Spotify |
| GPTea bag | Given Microsoftās recent $US 10B investment in the chat GPT maker, Open AI. Would you consider MSFT to be a reasonable investment if one wants exposure to GPT? |
| Fallen Joker | With the stars recent share price dive due to its laundering scandal. Does its expansion into Queensland with Brisbane Australia’s fastest growing city represent an investing opportunity long term or is the fall of Sydney to much ? |
| How Lowe can you go? | I have been researching buying an Australian REIT ETF. But I have noticed that my VAS ETF already has exposure to alot of REIT’s. Is there a role for extra exposure to REITS in a portfolio, I think the term is “overweight”? |
| WS | Hi Lads, love the poddy. Given your focus on ETFs, I thought Iād mention an alternative strategy for consideration. The STW ETF is the only ASX listed ETF with ETO derivatives over the underlying ETF. I run an option income strategy which includes selling cash covered PUTs & covered calls over STW to enhance the yield of the underlying ETF by collecting both dividends and Option premium. The Options are quarterly expiries so itās a relatively passive strategy in terms of trade frequency and is a great way to enhance the yield of an index tracking ETF. I know most people view Options as risky or speculative but when used sensibly they can be a great tool for investors looking to enhance the income from a portfolio. Interested to hear your thoughts. |
| Lurking Turkey | Iāve been a client of a high quality, holistic financial advisor for the past 13 years. Iām now approaching early retirement (hooray!) and have started thinking more closely both about post salary life, and what outcomes my annual financial planning fees deliver. I have one of those āengineeringā minds youāve talked about on the show, so this question led me down a rabbit hole of using historical data to imagine a couple of āwhat ifā scenarios, such as my advisors had recommended simply using the Vanguard diversified portfolio with the appropriate strategic asset allocation for my circumstances. The answer sadly is I would have been better off ā much better off if you consider fees or other simple, purely passive portfolios. I see a lot of value in good financial planning advice, but Iām now wondering if investment selection should be part of that advice. Is it reasonable to expect that planner managed portfolios should outperform purely passive portfolios with similar asset allocations in the long term? |
| Warren Buffett | I am currently studying in the US and renting here. I am Australian and have inherited about $400,000. I really donāt have an exact goal of what I want to achieve from my investments but I was writing to ask for advice. |
| Lurking Turkey | Hi. I submitted a similar but longer question earlier today – should have been more succinct. Hopefully the 2nd take is better…
Is it reasonable to expect that financial advisors should outperform purely passive strategies, for the same strategic asset allocation? Iāve recently been testing this with nearly 15 yearās worth of data from my own advisor-managed investment portfolio and concluded that the adage about fund managers rarely being able to beat the market also applies to advisors. In my case I would have been better off if the advisors had simply invested my money in the Vanguard diversified portfolio that aligned with my objectives. Holistic advice covers many valuable topics ā but should investment selection be one of them if purely passive strategies deliver better outcomes? |
| Vaga-Bond | Hi Gents
Thanks for your excellent podcastery. Hoping you can help explain how average weighted maturity in bond ETFs works. It seems like the bonds inside ETFs never reach maturity! Is this right? How can this be? Itās got me puzzled. Whatās going on with maturing bonds? Does the ETF issuer kick them out of the ETF? Do they have somewhere to go? How secure is it holding forever immature bonds? Thanks |
| James Bond | A recurring theme across a few podcasts I listen to is that bonds are back. Having never considered these as I have only been investing for a few years, I am unsure as to where to start. VBND looks like an easy option, but would you recommend looking into buying the bonds themselves? What would the pros and cons be? |
| Howard marks | I suffer from loss aversion bias and am fighting the urge to sell my stocks and switch to āsaferā asset classes as we transition from a decade of low rates, however am concerned of the albeit likely chance of a recession. Do I bite the bullet and realise losses on individual stocks in my satellite portfolio I was going to hodl as part of a long term trend conviction, or delete the brokerage app and ignore the red for a while? |
| Rask me once, Shame on Drew, Motley fool email me twice shame on me š | Do you know of any websites or applications that can combine ETFs to summarize the accumulative exposures to each company |