Global equity markets are down between 1.5 and 4 per cent led lower by concerns about the spread of the coronavirus.

 

Our balanced accounts are down between 0.5 and 0.75 per cent.

 

Volatility like this highlights the benefit of diversification ... ie, owning a mix of stocks, bonds, preferred shares and different currencies.

 

Client portfolios are benefiting from our significant over weight in utilities which are outperforming today and up significantly year-to-date.

 

We have discussed the merits of owning gold in portfolios as a hedge. Newmont Goldcorp is up 3 per cent today.

 

We are very pleased with our preferred share holdings which have been strong performers year-to-date and only slightly lower on the day.

 

At this point, we are not making any drastic changes. Historically, doing so has been the wrong thing to do in similar situations. However, we are vigilantly monitoring events as they occur.