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Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Debt Servicing Costs In 1995, Canada was teetering on the edge financially. For every dollar the government took in, it shelled out 35 cents to service the countries debt. Then under the austerity programs of both the Chrétien and Harper governments, Canada cleaned up its act. Debt service costs fell over 80%. Even with a covid pandemic and trade war forcing the government to spend more money, today we are still only shelling out 11 cents on the dollar for debt service - which is still manageable. The country to watch is the US. The amount of cash needed to service their debt is twice Canada’s and that number is expected to quickly reach the 30% danger zone. 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 - Cancelling Our Debt The far left has incredibly naive economic platforms. One that seems to be getting traction lately, is the belief that a countries financial problems can be solved by simply cancelling their debt. As one politician put it, make a big enough bonfire to burn all the countries IOU’s, and poof, the issues go away. What they don’t comprehend, is doing so shoots everyone in the foot. In a country like Canada, 65% of our debt is held domestically. The big owners are banks, pension funds, investment firms, and life insurance companies. Imagine your pension and insurance policies taking a massive haircut because of default. This would ruin the lives of countless ordinary people - the same folks those politicians are supposed to protect. 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 - Don’t Get Mad - Get Even Consumers love the convenience of credit cards and all the bonus points that accumulate from using them. Every day, the big three in this space, Visa, Mastercard, and American Express, collectively process roughly 1.3 billion transactions totalling $72 billion dollars. This generates 1.4 billion in daily fees for the card companies. People get offended by credit card companies stranglehold on the market, high user costs, and incredible profitability. There is a lesson here for investors. When you find a sector that makes large profits off you on a regular basis, that you can’t do anything about- don’t get mad - get even. Buy their stock. The profits, should more than pay for the costs of owning the card. 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 Healthcare Rankings The solution usually brought forward to solve Canada’s chronic healthcare problems is to simply spend more money. Yet compared to 32 other high-income countries with universal health-care, Canada is the second highest spender, but among the worst at delivering services. In 2024, Canada ranked second last for doctor availability, 26 of 31 for access to physical care hospital beds, 28 of 31 for availability of MRI machines and CT scanners, and last for a patients ability to make same - or next-day appointments. Canada needs to focus on using the enormous amounts of money we already spend on healthcare more efficiently, not just asking for 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 - Election Fear Mongering Investors have always worried that the outcome of US mid-term elections could be bad for markets. Yet the S&P 500 has averaged double-digit gains going back to 1933 whether one party holds the House, Senate and presidency, or the House and Senate are each controlled by different parties, or even if the House and Senate are controlled by one party with a president coming from the other. Going back to 1950, the S&P 500 has seen positive returns in the year after a midterm election, 95% of the time. Fear mongering attracts eyeballs which attracts advertising. It is done to make money, not help you be a smarter investor. 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 Is AI Tanking? Artificial intelligence is seeing the biggest infrastructure buildout in history. Until recently, investors just assumed, the spending that supports it would never end. Now that the fascination has worn off, they are starting to ask three important questions. Will the demand be there to support all these facilities? Will people be willing to pay for the service? Will the profits be enough to repay all the money that has been borrowed to finance its development? The answers still aren’t clear as to how all this is going to play out. That is why investors are taking their foot off the gas to do a reality check - putting AI stocks in the tank. 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 - Auto Makers Find New Opportunities The European and North American auto industries have been in turmoil for years. Environmental regulations, tariffs and higher borrowing costs are pushing new vehicle prices beyond the ability of much of the population to afford. Another problem is competition. The Chinese are flooding international markets with inexpensive vehicles. Even with these issues, there are some potential bright spots. The auto industry knows how to build stuff, and that expertise is increasingly valuable as countries everywhere work on rebuilding and on shoring domestic industry. Vehicle manufacturers are contracting out services to the defense industry, producing industrial batteries for electrical storage and developing robotics…just to name a few. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca o.r CFCW.com.

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - AI Needs Guard Rails The US and China are in a battle to develop Artificial intelligence. The victors will achieve worldwide dominance in both defence and industrial development. The race has tightened to the point where Chinese AI models are estimated to be only 6 months behind the most powerful American ones. Even though AI has shown it can disobey human commands, escape secure environments, and wreak real-world havoc, no country wants to take its foot off the gas pedal and risk losing the race. Experts are pleading for both countries to reign in development until regulation and safeguards can be put in place. So far - no one is listening 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 - Political Dreaming Political parties develop economic platforms that focus on easy promises voters like, but avoid the tough things they don’t. Take for example lowering taxes. The benefits are promised to produce an economic upswing that will create more wealth. The problem is that in the real world, tax reductions by themselves don’t work. They need to be accompanied by other things which cause pain and voters don’t like. Since 1980, there have been five periods in the US where tax cuts were implemented. In 4 out of 5 of them, there was no sustained economic improvement. Only in the minds of politicians and the people who vote for them do economic promises come with free lunches. 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 - Private Equity Funds Private equity funds have seen huge growth. They buy companies that aren’t publicly traded with the rationale that these businesses are much cheaper than equivalent ones traded on the stock market. Their success has created a problem. With over 13,000 private equity funds now open for business in the US alone, there are too many funds for the opportunities available. New entrants are finding it hard to generate great returns because many of the best opportunities have already been picked over. Investors need to be conscious of this when investing in this area, especially if a mediocre performer is taking the standard fee of 20% of the 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 - A Cash Stash Futurists often talk about the day when societies will move past physical currencies, and all financial activity will be digitally or electronically based. For this reason, many people no longer carry cash, or for that matter, have an emergency stash they keep at home. This is a mistake. If the electricity doesn’t work, or our digital infrastructure crashes or gets hacked, you and everyone else will lose the ability to buy essentials like food, medicine and fuel unless you have physical currency. I am not suggesting you prepare for the end of the world, but being practical would suggest having enough cash around to take care of necessities for a week or so in case our digital world sputters. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com. Sent from my iPad

Making Money Minute with Ron Hiebert - Government Aren’t Good At Business Canada wants to build all kinds of infrastructure to make us less dependent on the US. The problem is that our projects seem to end up costing 2 to 5 times as much to complete as our foreign competitors. Whether we talk about pipelines, dams, electrical transmission or nuclear power … our cost over runs are third world. When prices stampede, profits disappear and anyone who knows how to use a calculator runs for the exit. The only player left who is willing to pour money down a hole is the government. Eventually this leaves tax payers holding the bag owning a portfolio of losers needing continued subsidies to survive. 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 - Public vs Private Markets Publicly traded securities are priced at whatever buyers and sellers establish as their worth. Because situations can change rapidly in a free market economy, so do opinions and the prices investors are willing to pay. The negative side of being public is volatility. The positive is price transparency. Private equity owns assets that don’t trade regularly or at all. Securities in these portfolios are priced using computer models that determine theoretical values. These calculations provide what investors like - stable prices. The problem is that computer models seldom give investors price clues of pending disaster. Public markets provide transparency and liquidity - two things private equity lacks. 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 - What Are The Odds What brings gamblers into the stock market is the hope that they find the next Apple or Nvidia before it has a phenomenal price increase. They then plan to take a couple grand, hop on board, and let the ride make them a millionaire. Good on you if it works - but really….what are the odds of taking $2000 and putting it on a company that goes up 500 times so you end up with a million. In the US, over the last century, there have been about 30,000 companies that have publicly listed their shares. Only 100, or .3% of the total, went up the 500 times needed to make you a millionaire. The other 99.7% didn’t. There is an old Scottish proverb that says, “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” 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 - Lipstick on a Pig One of the great linguistic achievements of modern economics, has been its ability to take very alarming trends and wipe them from our collective memories by giving them nicer names. Debt became stimulus, government spending became investment, money printing became liquidity, bailouts became stabilization, intervention became support, inflation became growth, and budget cuts became right sizing. Pompous sounding government programs like the Supply & Confidence Agreement or The Inflation Reduction Act are really just patches on a very leaky economic balloon. Putting lipstick on a pig - doesn’t make the problem go away. For more information listen to our Making Money podcast with Ron Hiebert and Graham Hicks at letsmakemoney.ca or CFCW.com.