Could this be done? 2 charts by FI by province. | General financial discussion | Discussion forum

I think that's getting a bit complicated. We'd also be relying, largely, on anecdotal evidence.

The comparison chart cannot possibly provide every detail, nor should it. There are certain things people will just have to investigate by themselves.

Cheers,
Doug

We could do that. We could potentially link to it from the site, or just create a forum thread that links to it and have Peter "pin" it in the appropriate forum.

I would recommend that if you, or someone else, decides to create a Google spreadsheet like that that we qualify it with something like this is being based on anecdotal information from forum members and that it is subject to change at any time and may not be accurate.

Cheers,
Doug

It's definitely something we could set up. If you want to set up a Google spreadsheet, with appropriate disclaimers/caveats and share a link to it in a thread, I'm sure Peter wouldn't mind pinning your thread to a forum. 🙂

I was thinking of starting a brokerage savings account & GIC Google spreadsheet and sharing a similar think, if there would be interest in such a spreadsheet.

Cheers,
Doug

GICinvestor said
Not that I want to throw a “but” here as, many others seem to do.

If you list brokerage GIC rates say for ITrade then the costs to have an account need to be covered. Ie only a TFSA Account at iTrade is free along with what buy/sells are free. I do like that all GICs are from CDIC FIs. But would they deal with my province for probate and POA...actually I think they do. I find them to official and starchy to communicate with. And GIC rates are better than big 5 but overall not that great in my opinion.

I can send you iTrade GIC rates if you like.  

As far as I can tell, there's no fees for Scotia iTRADE GICs. And, from the looks of Scotia iTRADE rates, they seem to match the deposit broker GIC rates from the individual issuer websites (i.e., Concentra Bank), so I don't even think they take a commission on them. Scotia iTRADE does not have any account admin fees as long as you either (a) hold $15,000 in a non-registered account or (b) have a registered account, possibly with the same minimum balance. For most people, this wouldn't be an issue, I think.

I also still have my Virtual Brokers account open, so have access to their rates as well. They have access to a lot more GICs - best you can get is 2.51% on a 1-year GIC, which, I think, is with Bridgewater Bank.

Cheers,
Doug

GICinvestor said
Haven’t read the rules for iTrade for awhile. I have an account and can say.
No fees at all, no minimum, for a TFSA Account
The have a list of commission free ETFs
Their GIC buys are free
You do get online documents for all you sell/buy transactions but not sure what you get for a matured GIC.
Transfers in/out of TFSA are free.

Cash and RRSP accounts have fees and or minimums to avoid fees.

If their Home Trust/Bank GIC rates where the same as what Oaken posts I would keep iTrade. Will check in a few days.....but I very much doubt it.  

They are the same as the Home Trust/Home Bank deposit broker rates published at hometrust.ca. Not the same as Oaken because Oaken is slightly higher being in the direct-to-consumer space.

Yes, the registered accounts, possibly excluding TFSA, have annual fees to waive minimum balance. However, (a) they look at your combined account balances for fee waiver, not each account and (b) you can let them know all the people residing in the same household to waive those fees, too. If you have a full Power of Attorney for someone, too, those balances can be included in the admin fee waiver. And, the balance requirements are small ($15,000, I think).

With Scotia iTRADE, I have the following:

- Non-registered account (~$40,000 in equities and cash)
- RRSP (~$50,000 in passive index ETFs and cash)
- Locked-In RRSP (federal legislation; ~$18,000 in passive index ETFs and cash)
- TFSA (~$20,000 in mostly REITs and cash; this account has performed with the worst, with my investments in Street Capital Group, Inc., and American Hotel Income Properties REIT LP performing the worst)

No fees on any of them. As Briguy reminded me, XGRO and XBAL single-ticket portfolio ETFs can be bought commission-free because, as I looked into it, their predecessor ETFs CBN and CBD were on Scotia iTRADE's commission-free list (and still are).

Cheers,
Doug

I think all this stuff is getting way too complicated and well past the mandate of this forum. Some things are more important to some folk than others. People like Rob Carrick of G&M have annual reviews of discount brokerages, as does MoneySense I think. It would take a lot of work to duplicate whatever is being done elsewhere, and may never be current.

Regarding GICs, it doesn't actually matter what GIC options and rates are at individual discount brokerages (DB). When an investor has an account at DB1, that is where s/he is going to buy their GICs. What may be more important for lovers of GICs is which DBs offer fully online purchasing of GICs and who has the most extensive list.

From my experience and anecdotal information I have gotten from online forums is Scotia iTrade has the longest list of GIC issuers, and RBC DI and BMO IL are about the same in second place (we have accounts at all 3). Scotia iTrade, RBC DI and BMO IL all have fully online GIC purchases and rates are almost exactly the same. Anecdotally, I understand TDDI requires a phone call. Don't know about CIBC IE, and some of the independents don't offer GICs at all.

GIC rates at DBs will be, on average, 1/4% or more spread than directly with online banking because 1/4% is the commission rate GIC issuers pay to DBs to sell their product. Hence why Home Trust rates are less than Oaken Financial, etc, etc.

Everyone needs to do their homework for what is important to them.

Did not know that about VB. Learn something every day.