Podcast appearances and mentions of graham hicks

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - AI's Big Promises Our current bull market is effectively one gigantic bet on Artificial Intelligence. Since Chat-GPT was launched in November 2022, AI-related stocks have accounted for 75% of market gains, 80% of market profits, and 95% of capital expenditures in the US. The single most important issue determining whether this bull market will continue, is based upon the answer to a simple question. Will Artificial Intelligence, or the AI revolution, be able to deliver on its optimistic promises of boosting productivity and reducing costs? If so - all is well. If not - investors could be in for a world of hurt. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Past Performance & The Future Investing is based on the cult of performance, but as is so often repeated - past performance does not guarantee future results. Take for example, the services that rank mutual fund managers on a scale of one to five stars - with five stars being the highest. It seems intuitive that picking a five star fund would be the logical investment choice. But experience shows that it isn't. Only about 12% to 14% of 5-star rated mutual funds manage to retain their 5-star status the following year. Past performance has a track record and is easy to rank - but it is not a reliable indicator of how much profit a fund will generate in the future. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Boomers & Home Prices If you are thinking that your dream home is beyond reach - that could change given time. Demand for mid to higher end homes is likely to be lower as demographics shift. Baby boomers are aging, younger generations are smaller in number, birthrates are low, and policy changes have thinned immigration. This will bring a lot of housing units onto the market, as baby boomers, which are the largest home owning generation ever, make their exit. This could create a glut of middle and higher end homes. When supply is greater than demand, prices drop, and that is when dreams can become reality. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Tech Spending & Growth Massive investments in technology were the major driver of US economic growth in 2025. Harvard economist Jason Furman, calculated that technology investments accounted for 92% of Gross Domestic Product growth last year. Other research suggests that AI data center buildouts contributed more to the economy than all consumer spending in America combined in 2025. The huge flows of capital, concentrating on the the buildout of data centres and artificial intelligence capability, mask how weak the rest of the US economy currently is. I just hope that this capital investment can provide all the efficiency and economic growth the tech companies are promising, or there will be some unpleasant surprises ahead. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Alberta's Tax Freedom Day We certainly pay a lot of taxes. Even in Alberta where the burden is less than most other provinces, tax freedom day didn't come this year until May 25th. If the average Canadian family had to pay their taxes first each year, before keeping any for themselves, tax freedom day would be the date on the calendar you would actually start doing that. The average Alberta family pays $64,566 annually in taxes, which works out to 37% of total income. If you wonder where it all goes, 67.3% is passed on to the Fed's, 26.3% stays with the province and only 6.4% trickles down to municipalities. As tax freedom day demonstrates, Canada doesn't have an income crisis - but a spending one. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Canada's Poor Economic Performance Canada has become a world leader. Unfortunately it is in the areas you don't want to be ranked. Our nations finances have deteriorated faster than any country in the G7 over the last decade. And if we expand this comparison to a larger group of the 40 most advanced economies worldwide, the results are very similar. Canada experienced the 2nd highest increase in its size of government and the 3rd highest increase in its overall debt burden, from 2014 to 2024. Canada's fiscal discipline used to be the envy of the world - today as we sit in recession…not so much. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - New Issue Profitability The new issue market is heating up again. Lots of companies are deciding that the timing is right to transition from private to publicly owned. Coming to the market for the first time and issuing shares is exciting because it gives investors the ability to participate in new opportunities. The important question - “Will these new issues make money for investors?” Between 1980 and 2024, companies that were profitable before they went public saw their shares over the next three years increase by 33.6%. Companies that weren't profitable before going public actually saw their shares decline by 1/2 a percent over the same period. If you buy new issues that are already profitable - it is more likely, so will you. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Country Subsidies China has an investment strategy it took three decades for the west to figure out. Beijing, looked for the next generation of promising industries like electric cars, batteries, solar and communications technology. They then supported start up companies in these key sectors with subsidies that allowed them to produce products cheaper than any of their competitors. This forced the competition out of business and left China controlling the market. We are starting to wake up and change our policy. The west is now investing directly in rare earths, nuclear fuel processing and computer chip manufacturing. Expect the number of countries doing this, and the key industries they support to expand. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Battery Storage Companies that specialized in making lithium ion batteries have had sluggish sales growth the last few years. The problem is both from the batteries high cost and their limited capacity. But that is changing. As costs have come down and storage capacity gone up, batteries have found a whole new market besides electric cars. It has become economic for producers of renewable energy, like wind and solar, to store their surplus power in battery units for later use. Energy storage made up only 2% of percent of battery sales five years ago. China's CATL, the world's biggest battery maker, expects energy storage to account for half of its global output by 2030. This presents investors with a whole new avenue of growth. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Trump - Mid Term Lame Duck It appears that peace talks between Iran and the US are going nowhere. This also seems to be true regarding Canada's free trade negotiations with the United States. One of the reasons both are stalled could be the American mid term elections in November. If current polling of voter preferences is even remotely accurate, the Democrats are expected to gain a majority in the House of Representatives replacing Trump's Republicans. If this happens, it is going to be much harder for Trump to push through legislation. Dealing with a lame duck president might be a better situation for both Iran and Canada than they are facing right now - so why not wait. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Dividend Aristocrats & Kings One of the ways to measure how durable a companies profits are, is to look at its dividend history. Dividends are the portion of a companies earnings that get paid out to shareholders in cash. The premise, is, that unless profits are going up, the company eventually runs out of money to increase the dividend. In the US, there are 57 companies currently which have increased their dividends annually for at least 50 years. They are often referred to as Dividend Kings. In Canada, which is a smaller market, we only have two companies that meet this criteria, but there are another 11 that have hiked their dividends every year for the last 30. If you want to build a quality portfolio, looking at companies with long histories of dividend increases is a great place to start. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Tariffs & China America's annual trade deficit with China today stands at roughly $202 billion US dollars. That is down from its peak only four years ago of twice that much. For Europe the numbers are going the other way. Their current $360 billion dollar trade imbalance with China has grown by 89% over the last decade. Europe, used to ridicule America for the tariffs and restrictions it used to put the brakes on Chinese imports. Now that Europe's trade numbers have swung sharply in China's favor, Europe is actively looking to do the same thing. The world is moving from free to managed trade. It has to, when dealing with countries like China, who don't honour patents, heavily subsidize state owned business and restrict imports. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Immigration & Employment People are seeing, how slowing immigration growth, has helped ease home rental costs. Yet, very little has been said about how slowing population growth has also boosted Canadian employment numbers. Baby boomers are retiring in hoards. Last year saw 26k workers retire every month. That gap has to be filled. Caps on temporary residents has reduced the supply of workers from abroad. That hole is being filled with local workers, causing the unemployment rate to drop. This is welcome relief for a country that is suffering economically from American tariffs. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - The Underground Economy One of the reasons it is so hard to make economic predictions, is because there is so much information that analysts don't have much data on, despite their show of confidence. One of those factors is the black market or underground economy. That is a part of the financial plumbing, where trade and employment are neither reported nor taxed. And globally those numbers are huge. In developed nations, 17% of all economic activity is underground. In developing nations, that figure rises to a 1/3. When you have such a huge chunk of global financial activity going unreported, economic predictions are hard to get right. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Governments Subsidize Key Industries COVID helped us to realize that having local suppliers of essential products is important. That is why governments are working hard to reshore production of critical items like drugs, medical supplies, rare earths, chemicals and batteries. To fast track the transition, governments are buying shares in companies, guaranteeing to purchase finished products, and like the Chinese, erecting walls to keep the competition out. Investors should be paying attention. When governments financially support you and block the competition, this is often a recipe for big profits. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Taxing Unrealized Profits The next frontier in governments ever increasing reach to separate you from your money is the annual taxation of unrealized profits on assets, even though they continue to be held and aren't sold. In their crosshairs are investments like stocks, homes, businesses, art, precious metals and cryptocurrency. Countries have been watching the Netherlands and Switzerland closely to assess the impact. Both have been early adopters of this new form of taxation. The risk with this approach, is that the people who end up moving elsewhere are the ones this tax is intended to target - the wealthy. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Defensive Portfolios Building a defensive stock portfolio isn't rocket science. For ideas, just think about all the products and services you need to buy whether the economy is good or bad. You switch on the lights when it is dark. Turn up the thermostat when it gets cold. Take the trash to the curb once a week. You shower, shave and eat breakfast before driving to work. All these activities are non discretionary. They are continuous expenditures. With a little research, you will find that behind many of these services are public companies with shares that trade on the stock market. These are great candidates for a defensive portfolio. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Are Tariffs Here To Stay? Back in February, many foreign countries breathed a sigh of relief when the US Supreme Court struck down the broad based tariffs that the Trump administration imposed. This set in motion a mad scramble by US companies to apply for the 166 billion in refunds these tariffs had accumulated. Trump, unfazed, said he would be back with a new set of tariffs that would be much harder for the courts to challenge. It took months to conjure up a revised formula, but the new trade rules are just starting to roll out. Anyone hoping they would disappear is going to be disappointed. As long as Trump is president, tariffs look like they are here to stay. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - IPO Performance The markets are seeing more owners taking their companies public, than we have seen in years. Names like SpaceX and Antropic, the Artificial intelligence platform, have got the markets buzzing. But the question investors should be asking, is how have new issues performed compared to the markets as a whole. Is it worth venturing into this unknown? The stats show that between 1980 and 2024, the average Initial Public Offering went up by 5.6% in the first year, and over 3 years, underperformed the markets as a whole by 20.5%. There are exceptions, but generally new issues are aggressively priced to the advantage of the seller and not the buyer. Investors need to be selective. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Ways To Play AI Is SpaceX important to the future of AI? Of course? Whether you should buy it, is an entirely different discussion. At current prices, investors are paying $90 dollars for every dollar of sales the company generated last year. That is extraordinarily rich. If you want to participate in AI by owning companies with more reasonable valuations, look at some of the un-hyped suppliers to this industry that get paid no matter which AI platform wins. Companies that provide the fuel, produce the electricity, expand the grid or produce the metals needed to build out AI infrastructure - these are the unsung heroes of the artificial intelligence boom. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - The Kid Headache A lot of retirees are able to look back on a life filled with great careers, substantial charitable commitments, deep friendships and financial success. Yet their one sore point, is kids who never give them the time of day, except when they need the bank of mom and dad to bail them out financially. If you have this kind of relationship, do what actors like James Brown and Jerry Lewis did - write them out of your will or divert a substantial portion of your wealth - while living - to worthy causes or people. There are far better places to put your wealth, than in the hands of kids, who don't appreciate or deserve it. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Six Minutes It just makes sense, to do your homework before making an expensive purchase. Car buyers on average, do over 10 hours of online research, and visit at least four dealerships before closing a deal. Home buyers spend approximately 124 hours over several months, researching and looking for a home before making a purchase. Contrast this to the average investor. They typically take only 6 minutes studying an investment before pulling the trigger. If you don't know what you're doing, trading stocks is an expensive place to find out. The market is a conveyor belt that eventually transfers money from those who don't know what they are doing, to those who do. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Vehicle Purchase Scams In the past, buying a car was usually done in person. You would meet the owner or go to a dealership and see someone face to face. Then would come the vehicle inspection, test drive and discussion about price. Today more and more auto transactions are taking place on line. The buyer never meets anyone and doesn't see the vehicle until it shows up at their doorstep. This digital sales process has led to a big increase in vehicle scams. Thieves put up fake websites, post pictures of fake showrooms, and show detailed shots of fake inventory. Vehicles are big ticket items. If you are going to buy online, do your homework to ensure the buyer is real. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

AI's Second Act Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Investors who are disappointed because they missed out on the recent huge gains made by AI stocks shouldn't feel the party is over. We are likely early in the game - just finishing Round 1. Where AI models and supporting infrastructure get tested and developed. Round 2 is the global rollout. This is where Artificial Intelligence finds its practical application in the daily lives of business, government and individuals. We're just starting Round 2, and it is still unclear what the most profitable uses will be. But if history is any indication, figuring this out, will be where the next round of profits comes from. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Strategic Reserves & Supercycles During the Covid epidemic, global supply chains collapsed, leading to shortages of many critical goods. It is happening again with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. We are experiencing shortages in oil, natural gas, fertilizer, aluminum and sulphur. The country that has spent many decades preparing for this is China. They have built massive surpluses in critical minerals, fossil fuels and grains … to be tapped into, during times like these. Other countries, who haven't been nearly as well prepared, are starting to follow China's example and create stockpiles of their own. This extra demand has some believing we could be entering a commodities super cycle lasting a decade or more. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Old School Economics Current economic thinking is to narrow the tax base as much as possible and get fewer and fewer people to pay more and more. And secondly, the solution to everything involves spending lavishly and not fiscal restraint. I am obviously showing my age here, but I can remember not too far back when most nations pushed for policies that expanded the tax base. They created economic conditions that allowed its citizens to earn more, causing the tax base to expand - not shrink. They also had the discipline to cut spending to match the revenue coming in. If we want a sustainable economy, we are going to have to get back to those strategies that made us a success in the first place. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - We The People I recently watched a public debate on economic policy. The audience would cheer and applaud every time one of the debaters would blame politicians, the rich, or big business for the economic quagmire we are in. Over the 90 minute event, the one group that was conveniently ignored was the general public. You, me, the neighbour next door, the rest of us. We take no blame for being economically illiterate, sinking in debt up to our eyeballs and continually electing people who promise to shower us with the most economic goodies. In a democracy, solutions start when the group known as “We The People”, starts taking accountability for their own actions, instead of blaming others. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Orbital Data Centers Rocket companies are the next big thing among tech investors. They will provide the transportation needed to build data centers in outer space. The advantage touted by fans of orbital data centers, is that they can be powered by solar energy - which is available 24/7 in space. The disadvantages no one wants to talk about, are the incredible costs to lift all the pieces into orbit, and the complexity of carrying out repairs when parts fail. Once again, investors are looking way over the horizon, and making bets on things that are far from reality, and even farther from profitability. Hope has never been a profitable investment strategy. But maybe this time, the dreamers will prove us wrong. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - The Best of Times Even though the world has its problems, we are still living in the greatest period in history. Across the long arc of human existence, economic growth crawled forward at a rate of perhaps 0.1 percent per year. This was enough to support a very gradual increase in population, but not enough to improve the average persons living standards. Then came the industrial and knowledge revolutions. Suddenly, there was progress, when before there had been none. Economic growth began to move upward much faster than the growth rate of the population. This has continued through to the present day, leaving mankind much better off financially than they have ever been. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Patience & Energy Investing The biggest spikes in oil prices historically, have always occurred as a result of wars, embargoes, or other political tensions in the Middle East. The reason is obvious. This area produces 30% of the world's total crude, so any disruption sends prices skyward. What isn't so obvious, is the timing of those disruptions. Most have caught the experts and general public alike, completely unaware. Because the Middle East is so unpredictable, the best investment strategy, is to wait for a time when the world is stable, oil prices are down, and oil stocks are cheap. Simply buy, hold your nose, and wait. A Middle East crisis will eventually appear out of nowhere - pushing prices higher. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Dividend Growth Dividend paying stocks are a wonderful thing. But companies, that can both, pay and grow their dividends over time - are even better. Like many Canadian investors, I have banks stocks in my portfolio that have been owned continuously for decades. This sector has amply rewarded us for our patience. Many of these bank shares have grown their dividends to a point where the yearly cash distribution per share is greater than the price originally paid for the shares in the first place. This is providing an annual cash return of 100% or more on the original investment, and that isn't even including share price appreciation. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Share Buybacks & Stock Prices For well over a century, most of the gains from owning stocks came from the dividends they paid - up to 90% in fact. Then things began to change. In our present era, only 30% of gains come from dividends. The remainder, or 70%, now comes from share price appreciation. One of the reasons for this, is, companies are using more of their profits to buy back shares instead of using them to pay out dividends. Last year, companies globally spent 1.3 trillion dollars on share buybacks. This pushed their share count down, and their share price up. It is one of the reasons, for the incredibly high prices, stocks are currently enjoying. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - The Alberta Advantage Revisited The Alberta advantage, is all about living in a place where you can earn more, and your cost of living, especially for homes and taxes, is less. This advantage really shows up in the amount people can save. Between 2019 and 2025, the average Alberta household was able to put about $65,000 in the piggy bank. BC, because of its high costs, saw household savings over the same period between 10 and 15 thousand. The Alberta advantage allows residents to save 4 to five times as much as those in the province next door. BC might have milder winters, but the cost for that privilege, makes it almost impossible for the average person living there, to get ahead financially. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Working Longer People are living longer, healthier lives. Over the past 50 years, average global life expectancy has risen from 62 to 75 years. Developed countries saw longevity increase from 72 to 82 years. This has many experts worried that those extra years in retirement, and the risk of lower government benefits, will lead to a financial crisis. Thankfully people are paying attention, and their solution is to simply work longer. Since 2000, the average number of years a person stays in the work force has risen by 12% - from 34 to 38 years. Economic necessity, is guiding people to make the adjustments necessary to ensure their retirement is successful. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Why Markets Remain High The stock markets keep hitting all time highs in spite of tariffs, regional wars, trade embargoes and $100 oil prices. This is leaving investors wondering why stocks continue to levitate on what seems like thin air. The answer involves money flows into artificial intelligence and defence. The estimated cost to build out AI infrastructure is 7 trillion dollars over the next five years. Defence spending is increasing dramatically because of wars in Ukraine and Iran. Also, America is pushing to get its allies to double and triple the amount they budget for military purposes. When huge flows of capital are injected into the global economy, it is massively stimulative for both corporate profits and stock prices. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - High Auto Prices In 2025, China built nearly as many vehicles, as the next six largest, auto-producing, countries combined. This dominance is driven not by just low prices. Advances in factory automation, car design software, battery efficiency and faster development cycles are giving the Chinese gains in productivity, variety and quality that are leaving their competitors in the dust. North American auto manufacturers survive by selling high priced SUV's and trucks, with big gas guzzling engines to the domestic market. Can they survive in a world of $2 a litre gas, and customers, who out of economic necessity, can't afford gas guzzlers that cost $40-$50 grand? For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Strait of Hormuz Solutions Free markets have a way of sorting things out. Take for example the Strait of Hormuz. 20% of the world's oil passes through this 40 km wide channel every day. Iran has used threats to shut it down as a political club going back almost 50 years. That will soon end. Saudi Arabia is building a pipeline which will deliver 5 to 7 million barrels a day to domestic ports on the Red Sea. Iraq is connecting pipelines, that will send its oil overland to refineries in Europe. The United Arab Emirate are building a pipeline around the strait, redirecting their oil to ports on the Persian Gulf. By late 2027, closing the Strait of Hormuz, will no longer hold the world hostage. Users, have built infrastructure to get around it. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - A Needle In The Haystack Some sectors of the economy are fairly easy to determine, which individual companies in it, will be winners or losers. Other sectors like technology, bioscience and junior mining are very hard. The number of companies in these areas that become successful are small in number…but for the ones that make it…the payoffs can be huge. For most investors, the way to get exposure to difficult sectors, is to buy an exchange traded fund that owns a basket of companies, rather than trying to pick individual stocks. As Jack Bogle often said, instead of looking for a needle in a haystack - just buy the haystack. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Investing & Ego Investing in stocks is no place for those who have never been wrong or can't be bear to be wrong. Some people are wired psychologically with a need to be consistently correct. For people like that, investing will simply chew them up mentally. Investing is a messy business. You make lots of mistakes, and all those mistakes are very visible. Even the best stock pickers are wrong 20% of the time. Those who can't compartmentalize their mistakes and move on, should seek someone more suited to manage their portfolios, or else they should stick with investments that aren't as stressful. Life has enough challenges. Investing shouldn't be one of them. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron HiebeRents Are Declining Long suffering Canadian renters are finally getting some relief. Average rents in Canada declined 4.7% year-over-year in April, falling by $100 to $2,027. This marks the 19th consecutive month of declines. The biggest drop in apartment rents has been in some of the secondary markets next to Canada's biggest cities. Richmond has declined -13.1%, Markham 12.0%, Oakville and Coquitlam -11.1% and Burnaby -10.2%. Slowing down the flood of immigrants into Canada and increasing construction of rental facilities has done wonders to make things more affordable. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Oil Shortage Impact Investors have pushed markets to new highs thinking that the oil shortage, caused by the US and Iran blocking the Strait of Hormuz, is something we will have no problem dealing with. Yet the big impact of losing 13 million barrels of oil production a day is still ahead of us. Most countries have made up the shortfall by drawing down their strategic oil reserves. This is only a short term solution. Unless some kind of settlement can be reached between the US and Iran by the end of June, reserves will dry up and the world's economy will have to face the full brunt of these shortages. Spiralling fuel prices, rising inflation and a global recession are the likely result. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - A Very Narrow Rally If your portfolio has recently been suffering the performance blues , it is because most market sectors are sucking gas. The S&P 500, which represents a broad swath of America's biggest and highest quality names, has seen 1/2 its recent gains come from 28 out of all 503 stocks. Most of these 28 companies are tech and Artificial Intelligence related. If you are concentrated in these sectors, your portfolio has outperformed. If it isn't, your investments have been treading water. A rally is healthiest when all boats rise together. When only a few stocks support the entire market, the uptrend is often skating on thin ice. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron HiebeTrade Agreements Take A Long Time I am not sure investors have thought through, how long it could take Canada, to renegotiate the free trade agreement with the US and Mexico. The last round of USMCA negotiations officially began on August 16, 2017, and wasn't concluded until September 30, 2018. It took 13 grinding months, regularly filled with intense political drama, before they were able to wrap up the deal. Meetings between the US and Canada haven't even started yet, and are expected to be far tougher than the those conducted 8 years ago. Long periods of uncertainty are seldom good for the stock market or the economy. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron HiebTechnology Pushback People invest in technology, like robotics, self driving cars, artificial intelligence and datacentres with a view that they are an unstoppable tsunami. But we are starting to see pushback from groups legitimately worried about the impact this technology will have on their careers and lifestyles. Groups, are trying to block the use of self driving cars in their cities. Municipalities, are refusing zoning changes to build data centres. Others like the movie industry, are organizing to restrict the use of AI in their profession. People are beginning to understand the enormous changes technology will have and are starting to pushback. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Employee Financial Literacy As every manager knows, an employees personal issues often get dragged into the work place. Studies show that one in three full-time employees have money worries that negatively impact their productivity at work. If you are an employer, a cost effective way to improve employee performance, is by offering a financial literacy program to staff covering basic topics like debt, budgeting, saving and retirement planning. Increased financial knowledge, can make employees better at managing their own affairs, and also help them become more savvy with corporate funds as well. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Consistently Profitable Companies One of the best investment strategies, is to avoid owning shares in companies or industries that aren't consistently profitable. A good example is the global airline industry. As a whole, between World War II and 2021, this sector lost more money than they made over the entire 76 year period. If it wasn't for all kinds of government support, the airline industry would be so dead you could stick a fork in it. If a company can't generate consistent profits, it eats money instead of earning it. No matter how exciting the story, investors need to avoid these financial black holes, or their capital will spiral down the drain, right along with them. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - A Clever Scam The most sophisticated internet scam I have recently seen, involves a fake email or text supposedly from your financial institution notifying you that money has been illegally taken out of your account. Of course, they need to contact you, to work on getting it back. You, obviously being too smart to be taken by this, call your bank directly. Typically, the bank never answers the phone, so you leave a message. The scammer knows that banks seldom return calls promptly, so they phone you shortly after you opened the email. Thinking it is a legit call, you give them all your information. You only figure out the scam, when your real financial institution calls back later. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Carney's Aggressive Strategy Negotiations on our trade free trade agreement with Mexico and the US will start in just over a month. The stakes are enormous for Canada and Mexico, but much less so for America, so Trump feels he can play hardball with us. Mexico's president, has chosen to turn the volume down and not react to Trump's insults. Mark Carney's strategy is to be much more aggressive in his response, and in hockey terms - go into the corner with his elbows up. I hope Carney knows what he is doing, by escalating the rhetoric. If he gets it wrong, we have a lot more to lose than the US does. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Safe Havens People wonder why there are so few safe havens anymore. Places you can hide when markets are in turmoil. Recently, when markets drop, even the quality stuff falls with it. The reason for this, has to do with the tremendous levels of debt people are taking on to invest. When markets go south, investors are forced to liquidate securities to bring their loans onside. The securities that are easiest to sell are the largest, highest quality ones, that trade the most volume. The upside, is these are usually the first securities to bounce back up. But that doesn't feel like much consolation, when your losing money. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert -Deficits Are Solvable If you found out your spending was 5% higher than your income, it wouldn't take a lot of economic fine tuning to get things back in balance because the difference between what's coming in and what's going out isn't that large. On a bigger scale, 5% is also the ballpark deficit gap most western governments face when they prepare their annual budgets. Yet, somehow, our elected officials find the task of budgeting and living within their means, impossible to do. A twenty or thirty percent spread between income and expenses would be a tough gap to close. But 5%. That should be very doable. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.