All posts by Pat McKeough

Safer investments for retirees: How to retire with less stress

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Overall we see safer investments for retirees as ones that focus on a long-term conservative strategy and make calculated use of RRSPs and RRIFs to boost returns

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Retirement planning is becoming more challenging for Canadians because they’re living longer and need larger retirement nest eggs.

This often manifests itself in “pre-retirement financial stress syndrome.”

That’s the malady that strikes when it dawns on you that you may not have enough money saved to be able to earn the retirement income stream you were banking on.

 

To alleviate this worry, we recommend Successful Investors base their retirement planning on a sound financial plan. Here are the four key variables that your plan should address to ensure you have sufficient retirement income:

  1. How much you expect to save prior to retirement;
  2. The return you expect on your savings;
  3. How much of that return you’ll have left after taxes;
  4. How much retirement income you’ll need once you’ve left the workforce.

Note, though, that if you’re heading into retirement and are short of money, you should move your investing in the direction of safer, more conservative investments. That’s a far better option than taking one last gamble.

Moving into “too safe” investments for retirees can sharply cut your long-term returns

This applies as well to “risk-reducing strategies,” of which there are many. One of the most common is the urge to “go into cash” (also known as “taking money off the table”) when you foresee a market downturn. Like all risk-reducing strategies, this one can seemingly work from time to time, by getting you out of the market before a drop. But it’s even more effective at ensuring that you are out of the market when prices are shooting upward.

In the stock market, downturns do come along from time to time. But they are far less common than fears of downturns, which are virtually non-stop.

Editor’s Note: Last chance to register for today’s free AI investing webinar, hosted by The Successful Investor and Findependence Hub. The webinar begins today at 11:30 a.m. EDT and will cover practical ways to approach investing in A.I. stocks while keeping risk in mind. We shared the full details in our Canada Day blog post last week, with a reminder on July 4. If you would like to attend, you can still register here.

Pat McKeough has been one of Canada’s most respected investment advisors for over three decades. He is the founder and senior editor of TSI Network and the founder of Successful Investor Wealth Management. He is also the author of several acclaimed investment books. This article was published on June 4, 2026 and is republished on Findependence Hub with permission.

Myths about Dividend Stocks in RRSP vs TFSA: Busted

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Dividend investors love rules of thumb. Rules are comforting, like a warm blanket. Unfortunately, some of the most popular rules around dividend stocks in RRSP vs TFSA are only partly true.

The cost is usually quiet. You rarely see a dramatic mistake on a single statement. Instead, you get small leaks that compound: a bit of withholding tax you cannot recover, a little extra taxable income later than you expected, and a placement decision that is hard to unwind without triggering tax.

Here is a myth-by-myth cleanup, with practical takeaways you can apply without needing a spreadsheet the size of Manitoba.

Myth #1: TFSA is Always Best for Dividends

Why it sticks: a TFSA is tax-free in Canada, so it sounds like the obvious place for any income.

The reality is more nuanced. A TFSA is often an excellent home for dividend income, but not every dividend behaves the same way once cross-border tax rules enter the room.

What’s true (and what’s not):

A TFSA is great for many dividend investors, especially when flexibility matters. The part that breaks is the word “always.”

The key exception: U.S. dividends in a TFSA

U.S. dividends paid into a TFSA commonly face 15% U.S. withholding tax, and the TFSA usually does not let you recover that amount. The Canada U.S. tax treaty generally treats RRSP and RRIF type plans differently than a TFSA for this purpose.

This is the classic U.S. dividend withholding tax TFSA vs RRSP issue. It is not theoretical. It shows up as less cash hitting your account.

When a TFSA is often best for dividends

A TFSA is often a strong home for:

  • Canadian dividend payers (TSX stocks and many Canadian-listed dividend ETFs), since there is no U.S. withholding problem on Canadian dividends
  • investors who value tax-free withdrawals and flexibility later
  • people who want retirement income planning that does not add to taxable income

Takeaway: A TFSA is fantastic, but it is not automatically best for every dividend source.

Myth #2: U.S. Withholding gets Refunded in a TFSA

Why it persists: investors remember that in a taxable account, foreign withholding can sometimes be offset with a foreign tax credit, so they assume the TFSA works the same way.

Reality: inside a TFSA, the U.S. withholding is generally not recoverable because you cannot claim the foreign tax credit there.

RRSP vs TFSA: the simple $100 dividend example

Using round numbers:

  • U.S. dividend in TFSA: $100 declared, $85 received (15% withheld, typically unrecoverable)
  • U.S. dividend in RRSP: $100 declared, $100 received (treaty relief commonly applies when held properly)

That 15% gap is not a one-time annoyance. If you reinvest and hold for years, it compounds.

Takeaway: if you hold U.S. dividend payers inside a TFSA, plan for some permanent leakage.

Myth #3: DRIPs are Taxed inside RRSP/TFSA

Why people think this: in non-registered accounts, reinvested dividends are still taxable each year, so it feels like reinvestment must create a tax event everywhere.

Reality: registered accounts are designed so you do not report income annually.

  • TFSA: investment income and growth in the account are tax-free
  • RRSP/RRIF: investment income is tax-deferred, and withdrawals are taxed as income later

So a DRIP inside an RRSP or TFSA does not trigger annual Canadian tax reporting.

One practical record-keeping note

In taxable accounts, adjusted cost base tracking matters, especially with DRIPs.
Inside RRSP and TFSA accounts, adjusted cost base tracking is generally not required for Canadian tax reporting because you are not reporting gains each year.

Takeaway: DRIP taxes are a taxable-account headache, not a registered-account one.

Myth #4: RRSP Withdrawals are “Lightly Taxed,” just like TFSA

Why it trips people up: the RRSP deduction at contribution time is memorable, so people assume the withdrawal has special treatment too.

Reality, stated plainly: RRSP withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income. They do not come out as dividends, and you do not get the dividend tax credit on the way out.

This matters for dividend-focused RRSP portfolios because the income can stack on top of CPP, OAS, and other retirement income sources.

Two income-planning issues that surprise dividend investors 

  1. RRIF minimum withdrawals can force taxable income once you convert, and the minimum usually rises with age.
  2. Higher taxable income can increase OAS recovery tax risk. TFSA withdrawals do not add to taxable income, but RRSP and RRIF withdrawals do.

Bottom line for dividend investors:

  • RRSP: tax-deferred growth now, taxable income later.
  • TFSA: tax-free growth and tax-free withdrawals.

Takeaway: the account wrapper changes the after-tax experience, even if the underlying holdings look the same.

Myth #5: All Dividend ETFs face the same Withholding

Why it sounds reasonable: an ETF is “just a wrapper,” so withholding must be the same everywhere.

Reality: withholding can vary based on: Continue Reading…

Why Secular Trends beat Market Indicators

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Forget about market indicators–picking up on secular trends is a much better way to spot top stocks

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Investors sometimes ask how I learned about investing and the stock market. The answer is that I started early, read a lot, and learned how to write so that readers understand what I’m saying.

I got started as a teenager, with a part-time job for an investment writer. My job was to gather and organize information on public companies and the economy. This called for a lot of reading, but I was always an avid reader.

Learning how to write easy-to-read material is also a plus. After all, you have to understand information to be able to explain it to others.

During my first full-time decade in the investing business, I learned that many factors influence market trends. Naturally, I tried to learn about or create market indicators that could tell me how these factors could help my investing. Gradually it dawned on me that most market indicators turn out to reflect the fact that random events tend to occur in bunches.

Some of these bunches are big enough and last long enough that you can mistake them for sure signs that the market is headed in a particular direction.

The four-year U.S. Presidential Election indicator is different. It’s the most valuable market indicator I know of because it takes advantage of recurring cycles in the U.S. Presidential Election cycle. It’s still far from perfect. However, you might say that every few years, it gives investors a helpful nudge in the right direction.

The four-year rule is of little interest to many investors, particularly those who are new to the game. They lack the patience for it. Over the years, I’ve talked to many young investors who seem more interested in short-term trading than in our long-term Successful Investor approach.

From their point of view, they don’t need to obsess about risk because they don’t have enough investment capital to worry about losses. They say they’ll switch to our approach when they’ve made a windfall in something that works out as they hoped. When they have more money to risk, they’ll be more careful with it.

The trouble is that since they disregard risk, they may never acquire the gains they hope for. All too often, they get sucked into one bad investment after another. These include short-term trading (particularly in so-called meme stocks), dabbling in stock options or IPOs or SPACs or cryptocurrencies or NFTs. Dabblers fail to see that the big gains in these opportunities go to those who sell them to the investing public.

Secular trends beat market indicators

In the 1980s, I lost interest in market indicators and began to focus on secular trends. These are economic trends that last longer (sometimes much longer) than the typical prosperity/recession cycle.

Back then, for instance, goldbugs were sure that federal deficit spending was responsible for the high inflation of the period. It seemed to me that they were paying too little attention to the economic changes going on, particularly the impact of the baby boomers’ entry into the workforce. When employers hired boomers, it raised costs, since these newcomers needed training (particularly women who were going to work in higher numbers than previously). Continue Reading…

Arbitrage in the Stock Market is your Friend, Especially with an AI Assist

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If you are Canadian and you buy or sell U.S. stocks, you need to remember that arbitrage in the stock market is your friend, all the more so when it has an assist from AI, or Artificial Intelligence.

Arbitrage is the simultaneous purchase and sale of an asset in different markets, to exploit tiny differences in prices. We take advantage of it for our Portfolio Management clients whenever we can, to cut their trading costs. Here’s how it works:

If we’re selling a Canadian stock for a client and plan to use the proceeds to buy a U.S. stock, we offer the Canadian stock (on a Canadian or U.S. exchange) for sale in U.S. funds. When we want to sell a U.S. stock to buy Canadian, we reverse the order and offer the U.S. stock for sale in Canadian funds.

Now that you can buy and sell in either currency on both sides of the border, arbitrageurs (also known as “arbs” — traders who buy and sell in two different currencies simultaneously) constantly monitor trading activity to spot slight differences in one currency versus the other. When they spot any such difference, they simultaneously buy the stock where it’s cheaper and sell it where it’s more expensive, eking out a tiny profit on the difference.

This trading activity serves to cut cross-border share-price differences to the point where they are, for practical purposes, negligible. This makes the markets more liquid. It cuts trading costs for everybody. Continue Reading…

7 ways to tell if a stock pays a solid Dividend and will keep doing so

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We believe investors will profit most, and do so with the least risk, by buying shares of well-established, dividend-paying stocks with strong business prospects.

That then raises the question, how to tell if a stock pays a solid dividend? How to find out if a stock pays dividends is an important skill for investors.

The best companies to invest in for dividends have strong positions in healthy industries. They also incorporate strong management that makes the right moves to remain competitive in changing marketplaces.

How to tell if a stock pays a sustainable dividend?

These types of stocks give investors an additional measure of safety in today’s volatile markets. And the best ones offer an attractive combination of moderate p/e’s (the ratio of a stock’s price to its per-share earnings), steady or rising dividend yields (annual dividend divided by the share price), and promising growth prospects.

Today we’re going to look at how to tell if a stock pays a dividend and — more important — if it’s likely to keep paying it. You’ll want to recognize these stocks when they are available. Learning how to find out if a stock pays dividends can help you make informed investment decisions.

But first, let’s quickly recap the value of dividends and dividend-paying stocks by looking at some reasons for investing in them.

Why invest in dividend stocks?

1.) Growth and income. The best dividend-paying stocks offer both capital-gains growth potential and regular income from dividend payments.

2.) Dividends can grow. Stock prices rise and fall, so capital losses can follow capital gains, at least temporarily. Interest on a bond or GIC holds steady, at best. But top-quality dividend-paying stocks like to ratchet their dividends upward: hold them steady in a bad year, raise them in a good one. That gives you a hedge against inflation.

3.) Dividends are a sign of investment quality. Some good companies reinvest profit to spur growth instead of paying dividends. But fraudulent and failing companies are hardly ever dividend-paying stocks. So if you only buy stocks that pay dividends, you’ll automatically stay out of almost all the market’s worst stocks.
For a true measure of stability, focus on those companies that have maintained or raised their dividends during a recession or stock-market downturn. That’s because these firms leave themselves enough room to handle periods of earnings volatility. By continually rewarding investors, and retaining enough cash to finance their businesses, they also provide an attractive mix of safety, income and growth.

4.) Dividend income gets favourable tax treatment. Taxpayers who hold Canadian dividend-paying stocks get an additional bonus. Their dividends are eligible for the dividend tax credit in Canada. This means that dividend income will be taxed at a lower rate than the same amount of interest income (investors in the highest tax bracket pay tax of about 25% on dividends, compared to about 54% on interest income). Investors in the highest tax bracket will now pay tax on capital gains at a rate of roughly 27%.

The 7 suggestions

1.)  How to tell if a stock pays a dividend? Look for companies with long-term success. These companies are the most likely to keep paying and increasing their dividends. Continue Reading…