Modern Investing Techniques — Episode 13

Modern Investing Techniques – Episode thirteen (Expanded Script – approximately two thousand four hundred fifty words) Monday morning, markets are open. Welcome back to Modern Investing Techniques, episode thirteen. It’s April sixth, 2026, and I’m Patrick coming to you from Vancouver. A brand-new week means fresh data, fresh catalysts, and fresh opportunities to put modern tools to work. Whether you’re listening on your commute across the GTA, while grabbing coffee in Calgary, or winding down in Halifax, let’s dig into what the markets are actually telling us right now. Before we go any further, the standard but important reminder: everything we discuss on this show is strictly for educational and entertainment purposes. The Practice Investment of the Day is a simulated trade using zero real dollars. I am not a licensed financial advisor, and nothing here constitutes financial advice, investment recommendations, or a solicitation to buy or sell any security. Always do your own research and consult a qualified professional before putting real capital at risk. Past performance is never a guarantee of future results. Let’s start with the big picture. Global equity funds just recorded their second straight week of inflows. That’s meaningful. Investors are increasingly pricing in hopes of a Middle East ceasefire, and that de-escalation narrative is lifting equity futures, supporting risk assets, and even giving Bitcoin a tailwind. When geopolitical tension eases, capital that was hiding in safe havens starts rotating back into growth-oriented and cyclical areas. That rotation is exactly why we’re seeing modest gains across North American indices this morning. As of the open, the S&P 500 is sitting at six thousand five hundred eighty-three, up about 0.1 percent. The NASDAQ Composite is at twenty-one thousand eight hundred seventy-nine, up 0.2 percent, while the T S X Composite is showing the most strength at thirty-three thousand one hundred eight, higher by 0.5 percent. The outperformance of the Canadian benchmark makes sense given our heavy energy and materials weighting — lower expected oil-price volatility from a potential ceasefire is removing a key headwind for Canadian equities. From a Canadian investor’s perspective, the key question this week is whether that ceasefire narrative can hold. If it does, we could see sustained relief in energy prices, which would help oil-sensitive names on the T S X while also supporting the broader risk-on mood that tends to lift Bitcoin and growth stocks. At the same time, Canadian listeners should keep the Bank of Canada’s upcoming interest-rate decision on December ninth and the release of the Summary of Deliberations on December twenty-third firmly on their radar. Those two dates will set the tone for longer-term monetary policy expectations and will directly influence how attractive our domestic banks, utilities, and real estate names look in a T F S A or R R S P. While the macro backdrop is giving the market room to breathe, some of the most interesting opportunities right now are being created at the company level through aggressive defense of brand equity. That observation leads us perfectly into today’s Strategy Spotlight: trademark portfolio defense as an asymmetric, event-driven opportunity. Here’s the core idea. When a well-known company decides to actively litigate to protect its trademarks, it’s often sending a quiet but powerful signal. Successful brand protection can eliminate marketplace confusion, strengthen legal moats, deter future infringement, and sometimes even force favorable settlements that improve cash flow or competitive positioning. Most retail investors completely miss these legal developments because they don’t show up in traditional earnings previews or analyst notes. In today’s environment of geopolitical tension and shifting consumer sentiment, protecting core brand value becomes even more critical. A strong, legally defended brand preserves pricing power and customer loyalty when uncertainty makes people more cautious with their spending. That stability is worth real money, especially for consumer-facing companies where brand can represent 30 to 50 percent of total enterprise value. So how do you actually implement this? Start simple. Use free resources like court dockets, SEDAR and EDGAR filings, or even Google News alerts with targeted keywords to flag companies that have multiple active trademark disputes. Once you have a short list, cross-reference those names against short interest data and options open interest. Elevated options activity around upcoming hearing dates often tells you that smarter money is already positioning for an outcome. Canadian investors have a built-in advantage here because trademark cases heard in Federal Court can move T S X listed names very quickly once a decision or settlement is announced. On platforms like Questrade or Interactive Brokers, you can set price alerts and calendar reminders around key hearing dates so you’re never caught off guard. Inside a T F S A, any settlement proceeds or damage awards receive extremely favorable tax treatment, which further improves the risk-reward of this strategy. Of course, no approach is without risk. Prolonged legal battles can pressure margins through higher legal fees, and an unfavorable ruling can temporarily weigh on the stock. That’s why I always recommend pairing this legal-event screen with solid technical and sentiment filters before allocating capital. Still, for disciplined investors willing to do a bit of extra homework, trademark defense cases represent one of those low-visibility, high-conviction setups that used to be reserved for hedge funds. Protecting the value of a company’s brand is one way smart investors defend their capital. Another equally important way is making sure the government isn’t holding onto your money interest-free. Let me paint a picture most Canadians will recognize. Imagine you received a two dollars,800 tax refund last year after over-withholding on your T4 income all year long. On the surface it feels like “free money” when that cheque arrives. But let’s do the math. That two dollars,800 refund actually represented an interest-free loan to the government of roughly two hundred thirty-three dollars per month. While you were giving Ottawa that float, the S&P 500 returned 11.4 percent over the same period. That’s real opportunity cost. The C R A’s withholding tables are deliberately conservative, which is why so many people end up with large refunds. A consistent refund that equals more than 8 to 10 percent of your total tax paid is usually a loud diagnostic signal that you’re not optimizing your payroll deductions, R R S P contributions, or eligible tax credits. The fix is straightforward but requires a little discipline. Run a quarterly tax projection worksheet using last year’s Notice of Assessment and your current pay stubs. Adjust your TD1 form accordingly. Many professionals also choose to accelerate R R S P contributions before year-end so that capital gets into the market sooner rather than sitting idle until tax time. The smartest Canadian investors treat a big tax refund not as a bonus, but as evidence they left money on the table all year. Beyond withholding, maintaining an accurate and up-to-date Adjusted Cost Base (A C B) spreadsheet is non-negotiable, especially inside a T F S A where superficial loss rules don’t apply but record-keeping still matters for compliance. Good tax software can flag potential superficial loss violations before they become expensive mistakes. The biggest mindset shift is moving from celebrating a large refund to obsessing over minimizing total tax paid over time. My practical advice: run a mid-year tax projection every July. Use that projection to either adjust your withholding or accelerate contributions into your T F S A, R R S P, or F H S A. When you keep more of your capital working for you all year inside tax-advantaged accounts, compounding does the heavy lifting. This is foundational wealth-building, not sexy, but incredibly effective. Keeping more of your money working for you is exactly why we run the Practice Investment of the Day each week. Let’s move into this week’s simulated trade. Our Practice Investment of the Day is a weekly hold in Citigroup. This is a simulated trade for educational purposes only — no real money is involved. The ticker is C — Citigroup Incorporated on the N Y S E. The strategy is a valuation-driven core banking play heading into the company’s 2026 Investor Day. The stock is currently trading at attractive multiples relative to the broader banking sector, which sets up the potential for positive re-rating once management lays out its strategic priorities. The primary catalyst is that scheduled Investor Day. These transparency events often lead to improved guidance, clearer capital-return plans, and multiple expansion as analysts update their models. On the technical side, the stock is trading near recent support on the daily chart with improving volume. It sits comfortably above its 50-day moving average but remains below the 200-day moving average — a classic base-building pattern that often precedes a move higher if the fundamental catalyst delivers. The key risk, of course, is renewed geopolitical tension in the Middle East that could spike energy prices and compress bank net interest margins. To manage that downside I’m using a suggested stop-loss approximately six percent below entry. The target for this weekly hold is a 3 to 8 percent gain by Friday’s close, driven by positive momentum from the Investor Day. I’m assigning this idea a medium confidence level. We have two clear factors aligned — attractive valuation and a scheduled corporate catalyst — but sector headwinds from energy-price volatility remain a legitimate uncertainty. That balance is exactly why we size these positions responsibly inside tax-advantaged accounts. This trade is a great teaching example of how to use scheduled corporate events as an analytical edge instead of chasing momentum. You’re learning to read valuation signals in the context of a known calendar catalyst, practice proper position sizing within a T F S A or R R S P, and develop the emotional discipline to hold through normal weekly noise. Even if the trade doesn’t work out, the lesson in forward-looking event analysis is still valuable. We’ll track this simulated Citigroup position all week and provide a full review on Friday. Before we move on, let’s quickly review yesterday’s Trade Review for our previous weekly hold in T S L A. We simulated a contrarian fade of negative analyst sentiment following recent price weakness, betting on an eventual relief-driven rebound. Entry was at three hundred sixty-five dollars and eighty-six cents on Monday’s open. We exited at three hundred sixty dollars and fifty-nine cents on Friday’s close. That resulted in a 1.44 percent loss, or fourteen dollars and forty cents on a one dollars,000 simulated position. Our running total across four simulated trades now sits at negative forty-four dollars and ninety-one cents. Win rate is one win out of four trades, or 25 percent. The current streak is one loss. The contrarian thesis simply didn’t receive the expected relief catalyst within the tight five-day window. This is a valuable reminder that short-term sentiment fades can sometimes take longer to resolve than our weekly hold timeframe allows. Moving forward, I’ll be tightening the catalyst filter to require either a clearly defined upcoming event or stronger technical confirmation before entry. Losses like this reinforce the importance of time-horizon discipline in simulated weekly holds. They’re tuition — and we make sure we learn from every dollar of it. These kinds of corporate and macro shifts can be caught early when you have the right tools in your arsenal. Two I recommend regularly are Seeking Alpha Premium and BNN Bloomberg real-time alerts. Seeking Alpha Premium lets you filter article feeds and quantitative ratings specifically for stocks described as attractively valued or undervalued heading into events. The real edge comes from surfacing high-quality fundamental analysis before the broader market reprices the name. Canadian users can easily pair it with Wealthsimple or Questrade watchlists to track both U.S. and T S X names. The free tier gives limited access, while Premium unlocks full quant ratings and comprehensive event calendars. On the news side, BNN Bloomberg real-time alerts are excellent. You can set mobile notifications for specific companies or keyword combinations like “trademark” plus a company name. This lets retail investors react to legal or regulatory developments within minutes — the same speed that institutional desks have used for years. It’s especially useful inside a T F S A or R R S P because you can make quick, targeted position adjustments without worrying about frequent-trading flags. Let’s circle back to a couple of the themes we touched on earlier. Global equity funds recorded their second consecutive weekly inflow as investors bet on reduced geopolitical risk. This rotation supports broad market participation and suggests continued appetite for risk assets in both Canadian and U.S. portfolios. Bitcoin hit a weekly high above sixty-nine dollars,000 on the same U.S.–Iran ceasefire hopes, while oil prices slid. That inverse correlation creates a practical rebalancing opportunity for Canadian investors. Many of you hold both energy names and crypto exposure inside your TFSAs — this is a textbook moment to consider trimming the outperformer and adding to the underperformer to keep your risk profile in check. On the income side, Brookfield Asset Management raised its dividend by 15 percent on the back of record assets under management. The combination of an attractive yield and visible growth makes it a name worth screening for income-oriented investors who want alternative asset exposure without taking on single-property real estate risk. Finally, a new poll shows majority Canadian support for exploring E U membership. While this is clearly a long-term conversation, it signals potential future shifts in trade policy, capital flows, and currency hedging decisions that could eventually affect how we construct cross-border portfolios. Looking at our overall simulated portfolio performance, we have now completed four trades. Win rate stands at 25 percent with one win, two losses, and one break-even. Cumulative P&L is negative forty-four dollars and ninety-one cents. Average return per trade is negative 1.12 percent. Our best trade delivered up four point four four percent while the worst was –7.49 percent. The current streak is one loss, but our process is learning from every outcome to refine future selections. Event-driven setups like this week’s Citigroup pick are exactly the kind of opportunities disciplined investors can surface early when they combine the right tools with structured analysis. Before we wrap up, keep a close eye on how the ceasefire narrative develops through the week and watch for any early reactions to the upcoming Bank of Canada communications. Those two macro factors will set the tone for risk assets well beyond this week. That wraps up today’s episode of Modern Investing Techniques. Remember — every trade, win or lose, is a learning opportunity. Subscribe if you haven’t already, share this episode with a friend who wants to invest smarter, and I’ll be back with you tomorrow. Until then, keep your process tight and your capital working. DISCLAIMER (read slowly): This podcast is for EDUCATIONAL and ENTERTAINMENT purposes only. Nothing discussed constitutes financial advice, investment recommendations, or solicitations to buy or sell securities. The “Practice Investment of the Day” uses SIMULATED trades with NO real money — it is a learning exercise to demonstrate analytical techniques. Past performance does not predict future results. Markets involve risk of loss. Always do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making investment decisions. The host and Nerra Network have no fiduciary relationship with listeners. This podcast is curated by Patrick but generated using AI voice synthesis of my voice using ElevenLabs. The primary reason to do this is I unfortunately don't have the time to be consistent with generating all the content and wanted to focus on creating consistent and regular episodes for all the themes that I enjoy and I hope others do as well.