Did Pretty Well Sittin' On My Duff...

Regular readers know that I live and die by fluctuations in the TSX because I'm pretty much all Canadian, all the time.  Other than simply trying to make money, I have a sub-goal...if there's such a thing, of matching or beating the TSX.  I'm happy to report that I beat the TSX for the quarter!

As of March 31 the TSX was up 2.48% for the year.  My portfolio value was up 3.34%.  What I like is that I did nothing.  Well almost nothing.  The only change I made in the quarter was to re-balance the one mutual fund account 50/50 between the Resource and Endeavour Funds in early January.  This worked out well as the change involved transferring to the Endeavour Fund which out performed the Resource Fund for the quarter.  Isn't is great when a plan comes together?  With a whole lot of eggs in two baskets, I would like to diversify this account by adding one more fund but I just can't seem to find a fund that has been performing like these two since the market bottomed in March of last year.

I have great hopes for the Resource Fund for April.  With the recent spike in oil price and gold holding well over $1,100.00, this fund should do well.  It's up 2.88% after three trading days, handily beating the  Endeavour Fund.

April started off very well.  Three trading days...new highs for the year for the past two days...my portfolio that is, despite a downward tick for the TSX yesterday. 

My April Fool's Day Cenovus (CVE) trade still bites.  The best I can say about that is the money I got for the shares hasn't gone down...in fact, I guess I could say that it's gone up as the Loonie touched par with the Greenback yesterday before dropping a tick.  Now, there's a spin.

Happy Investing! 

I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer...

and here's more proof.  Yet another item for the Note To Self file.

I didn't buy Cenovus Energy (CVE) shares, but I didn't get them free either.

One day I had Encana (ECA) shares valued at $57.63.  The next day I an equal number of Cenovus shares which traded at $26.30 that first day.  Needless to say, the Encana shares dropped by more than $26.30 to $30.13.  Such is life when a public company divides itself into two entities.  In this case, Encana the giant became Encana the gas company and Cenovus the oil company.

Initially the talking heads suggested keeping Encana and blowing off Cenovus.  Since then, sentiment has turned and there's a fairly even split between:  A) Keep both  B) Dump Encana  C) Dump Cenovus and D) Dump them both.  As usual, every analyst that BNN drags out of the woodwork has their own, and very different opinion. Not surprising retail investors get confused.  Who are you supposed to believe?

I've been holding Encana since last July and Cenovus since the split on December 1.  I've been getting pretty bored with both.  Cenovus has been as high as $27.84 so when I put in a sell order at $27.00 on March 22 when when it was trading at $25.24 it was a bit of a flier.  I figured, what the heck, if it happens to drift up there in the next while I'd be happy to unload them.

I reviewed the sell order last Monday.  Cenovus closed at $25.11 on Friday the 26th. As it had been trading in a tight range between $24.50 and $26.00 for some weeks, $27.00 seemed a long way off.  I renewed my sell order through April 2. 

I was in a bit of a fog when I staggered to my computer at 4:30 AM on April Fools Day.  Don't ask.  I noticed that Cenovus has spiked to $26.53 the day before.  I should have gone to (Bloomberg Commodities) to check the overnight price of oil.  I should have noted that the whole energy sector had gone up on Wednesday.  Gosh knows, I hold four major energy players and am monitoring ten others right on my Yahoo! Home Page.  Instead, I checked email, read a few blogs, stood on the scale and declared to my wife, for the tenth time since Christmas, that I am starting that diet right after the long weekend.  No way I starting before I get those chocolate bunnies!

You gotta know, I got taken out at $27.00 on the way up to $28.12.  That's the disadvantage of being a part-time trader.  Any self respecting day trader would have been all over the winds of change and canceled the $27.00 sell order before the markets opened, watched for a while and made an extra buck a share...or held if he could see some more upside.

On a positive note, I now have some liquidity in my trading account.  Just have to source out the next home run!

I should rename this bog, The Lazy Canadian Investor!