Tag: retirement-planning

What’s in my non-registered portfolio? (Oct 2025)

RobH3 Comments

Every month, I try to share with you what’s in my overall retirement portfolio (September 2025 post is here). That retirement portfolio is actually distributed over a bunch of accounts held by me and my spouse and includes RRIFs, TFSAs and non-registered accounts. This is what it looks like at the moment:

Retirement savings as of October 1, 2025 by account type

(My multi-asset tracker is a handy tool to help you quickly create charts that look like the above one).

My current strategy for these three account types looks like this:

  • RRIF: This is 100% invested in my ETF all-stars. I’m currently withdrawing RRIF minimum payments for two main reasons:
    • To avoid problems with attribution. I cover that topic over here.
    • To avoid withholding tax. RRIF minimum payments don’t attract withholding tax, but I am setting aside some of my payments to deal with the unavoidable tax bill come April 2026. I talked about that topic over here.
  • TFSA: This is mostly invested in the ETF all-stars, but there’s a few stragglers in here1 that I really ought to get rid of. Nothing wrong with the funds in there, but it’s a needless complexity. The TFSA continues to get new funds since it’s hard to beat tax-free growth, and I only buy all-stars with those funds. It will get drawn down last in my retirement planning.
  • Non-registered accounts: Here it’s a bit of a dog’s breakfast, with very little invested in the all-stars, mostly because most of the equity found here was bought long ago, and changing what I hold would attract capital gains that I would prefer to take on my own terms. It’s where the majority of my early-retirement decumulation takes place.

Here’s what that breakfast looks like:

What’s in my non-registered portfolio, October 2025

Here’s a look at each holding, from highest to lowest percentage.

HXT: This is a Canadian equity ETF that does not pay dividends, instead using some wizardry to bury it all in the per-unit price of the ETF. This simplifies taxes, and I have held this fund for a long time. Due to increasing costs of this ETF, it’s among the first to get liquidated as I need funds.

XIC: Canadian equity fund, very popular. I think I bought it to create a bit of dividend income. It will get liquidated after the Horizons funds go (HXS, HXT, HXDM).

SCHF: A very low-cost international equity2 fund in USD that I’ve held for a very long time. It’s funds like SCHF that attracted me to investing in USD, which, at present, adds a lot of complexity.

ICSH: This is one of the all-stars. It is what my VPW cash cushion is invested in3. I use ICSH more than ZMMK in the cash cushion because US interest rates are quite a bit higher than Canadian rates at the moment. I talked about that here.

HXS: Same idea as HXT, except it invests in the S&P 500. This one is held only by my spouse who is still working for a living, so this will just stick around a while, until she stops working and can take on the capital gains.

VSC: A bond fund held by my spouse. I may sell this to harvest some capital gains losses.

HXDM: Same idea as HXT, except international equity. It is on the list to liquidate.

ZMMK: An all-star, held in the same account as ICSH.

The rest (XEQT, TEQT, XGRO) are all new arrivals in the portfolio, purchased using dividends4 from the other funds as well as the bonus payments I keep collecting from Questrade for switching to them.

My non-registered accounts are only a small portion of my retirement holdings, but there’s a fair bit of complexity there. Over time, these accounts will go to zero other than the cash cushion portion (ZMMK, ICSH or whatever replacements I discover) which will remain as long as VPW is my decumulation strategy.

  1. Mostly pure Canadian equity funds. This is to offset AOA that has next-to-no Canadian equity component. ↩︎
  2. 0.03% MER. Cheap! ↩︎
  3. VPW = Variable Percentage Withdrawal, an absolutely brilliant strategy for making sure you don’t run out of money in retirement and don’t leave a lot on the table. Read all about it here. ↩︎
  4. With all ETF trades being free, I hold very little actual cash in any of my accounts. ↩︎

What’s in my retirement portfolio (Sept 2025)

RobH3 Comments

This is a monthly look at what’s in my retirement portfolio. The original post is here. Last month’s is here.

Portfolio Construction

The retirement portfolio is spread across a bunch of accounts:

  • 7 RRIF accounts (3 for me, 3 for my spouse, 1 at an alternative provider as a test)
  • 2 TFSA accounts
  • 4 non-registered accounts, (1 for me, 1 for my spouse, 2 joint)

The target for the overall portfolio is unchanged:

  • 80% equity, spread across Canadian, US and global markets for maximum diversification
  • 15% Bond funds, from a variety of Canadian, US and global markets
  • 5% cash, held in savings-like ETFs.

You can read about my asset-allocation approach to investing over here.

The view post-payday

I pay myself monthly in retirement, so that’s a good trigger to update this post. At market close, September 25, this is what it looks like:

Retirement holdings by ETF, September 2025

The portfolio is dominated by my ETF all-stars; anything not on that page is held in a non-registered account and won’t be fiddled with unless it’s part of my monthly decumulation. Otherwise I’ll rack up capital gains for no real benefit.

No massive changes this month; the one you might notice is a reduction in HXS, which holds US stocks exclusively. I picked this one to sell out of my non-registered accounts as my US equity allocation was a bit high.

Plan for the next month

The asset-class split looks like this

It’s looking pretty close to the targets I have, which are unchanged:

  • 5% cash or cash-like holdings like ICSH and ZMMK
  • 15% bonds (almost all are buried in XGRO and AOA)
  • 20% Canadian equity (mostly based on ETFs that mirror the S&P/TSX 60)
  • 36% US equity (dominated by ETFs that mirror the S&P 500, with a small sprinkling of Russell 2000)
  • 24% International equity (mostly, but not exclusively, developed markets)

I don’t need to make serious changes at this juncture, but there will be some need to make some noticeable tweaks in the coming month:

  • Q3 dividends will flow in to the account which will make for some movement, especially in XGRO and AOA. (Payout date for XGRO is September 29th , AOA is estimated to be October 8th.
  • I will need to convert some of my US RRIF holdings into CAD. I do this quarterly. Why quarterly? It allows me to smooth out any big swings in the FX rate over the course of the year. This will show up as a reduction in AOA and an increase in XGRO next month.
  • And, at the very end of October, AOA will rebalance. This is not foreseen to be a big deal.
  • All these moves will be tracked through my multi-asset tracker; it may be I have to buy a bit more foreign equity as I see I’m a touch light in that category.

Overall

The retirement savings had a great month, again. Overall, I’m now 8% ahead of where I started even though I’ve been drawing a monthly salary since the beginning of the year. This is aligned with what my retirement planner told me to expect, but as you can see, the journey has had some interesting ups and downs already.

Monthly retirement savings, as percentage of Jan 2025 value

My VPW-calculated salary has hit a new high this year, 4.22% higher than my first draw in January1. This is also expected, since it tracks the value of the retirement portfolio, albeit in a much more controlled way. The VPW “cash cushion” smooths out the ups and downs of the monthly returns. I suppose I really should see an increase in my salary on par with inflation so that I maintain my spending power. I’ll have to think about how to track that2.

Monthly salary, as percentage of Jan 2025 salary

What’s in my retirement portfolio (Aug 2025)

RobH1 Comment

This is a monthly look at what’s in my retirement portfolio. The original post is here. Last month’s is here.

Portfolio Construction

The retirement portfolio is spread across a bunch of accounts:

  • 7 RRIF accounts (3 for me, 3 for my spouse, 1 at an alternative provider as a test)
  • 2 TFSA accounts
  • 4 non-registered accounts, (1 for me, 1 for my spouse, 2 joint)

The target for the overall portfolio is unchanged:

  • 80% equity, spread across Canadian, US and global markets for maximum diversification
  • 15% Bond funds, from a variety of Canadian, US and global markets
  • 5% cash, held in savings-like ETFs.

You can read about my asset-allocation approach to investing over here.

The view post-payday

I pay myself monthly in retirement, so that’s a good trigger to update this post. At market close, August 22, this is what it looks like:

Retirement holdings by ETF, August 2025

The portfolio is dominated by my ETF all-stars; anything not on that page is held in a non-registered account and won’t be fiddled with unless it’s part of my monthly decumulation. Otherwise I’ll rack up capital gains for no real benefit.

The most noticeable change is a growth in the importance of ICSH to my portfolio at the expense of ZMMK. I did the math to justify performing a Norbert’s Gambit of the CAD generated by selling ZMMK and picking up ICSH. The amount of HXS remaining in the portfolio is dwindling, and may be gone altogether by next month. I choose which assets to sell out of my non-registered accounts by simply determining which asset category needs to be trimmed based on my multi-asset spreadsheet.

I also have a new way to track my AOA splits; since it rebalances itself twice annually, it seems to me wiser to fix its bond contribution at 20% in my multi-asset tracker. The equity splits between US, International, and Canadian are still dynamically calculated at least monthly using a properly weighted formula.

Plan for the next month

The asset-class split looks like this

It’s looking pretty close to the targets I have, which are unchanged:

  • 5% cash or cash-like holdings like ICSH and ZMMK
  • 15% bonds (almost all are buried in XGRO and AOA)
  • 20% Canadian equity (mostly based on ETFs that mirror the S&P/TSX 60)
  • 36% US equity (dominated by ETFs that mirror the S&P 500, with a small sprinkling of Russell 2000)
  • 24% International equity (mostly, but not exclusively, developed markets)

I don’t really see a need to make changes based on what I see here. Cash flowing in to the account (bonus payments, regular TFSA contributions) will be re-invested in one of XEQT or XGRO1, typically2.

Overall

The retirement savings had a great month. Overall, I’m ahead of where I started even though I’ve been drawing a monthly salary since the beginning of the year. This is aligned with what my retirement planner told me to expect, but as you can see, the journey has had some interesting ups and downs already.

Monthly retirement savings, as percentage of Jan 2025 value

My VPW-calculated salary has hit a new high this year, 2.41% higher than my first draw in January3. This is also expected, since it tracks the value of the retirement portfolio, albeit in a much more controlled way. The VPW “cash cushion” smooths out the ups and downs of the monthly returns. I suppose I really should see an increase in my salary on par with inflation so that I maintain my spending power. I’ll have to think about how to track that4.

Monthly salary, as percentage of Jan 2025 salary
  1. I have purchased some TEQT lately since it has a lower MER. I covered TD’s family of all-in-ones here. ↩︎
  2. Since my target is 15% bonds, and XGRO is 20% bonds, I have to offset some of the XGRO purchases with 100% equity purchases. ↩︎
  3. Not a bad raise. ↩︎
  4. Looks like https://www.statcan.gc.ca/en/subjects-start/prices_and_price_indexes/consumer_price_indexes is a good place to start. ↩︎

What’s in my retirement portfolio (July 2025)

RobH4 Comments

This is a (hopefully monthly) look at what’s in my retirement portfolio. The original post is here. Last month’s is here.

Portfolio Construction

The retirement portfolio is spread across a bunch of accounts:

  • 7 RRIF accounts (3 for me, 3 for my spouse, 1 at an alternative provider as a test)
  • 2 TFSA accounts
  • 4 non-registered accounts, (1 for me, 1 for my spouse, 2 joint)

The target for the overall portfolio is unchanged:

  • 80% equity, spread across Canadian, US and global markets for maximum diversification
  • 15% Bond funds, from a variety of Canadian, US and global markets
  • 5% cash, held in savings-like ETFs.

You can read about my asset-allocation approach to investing over here.

The view as of this morning

As of this morning, this is what the overall portfolio looks like:

Retirement holdings by ETF, July 2025

The portfolio is dominated by my ETF all-stars; anything not on that page is held in a non-registered account and won’t be fiddled with unless it’s part of my monthly decumulation. Otherwise I’ll rack up capital gains for no real benefit.

There weren’t big changes this month. My monthly decumulation from my RRIF accounts involves selling enough XGRO to meet RRIF-minimum payments, and the rest of my retirement paycheque is funded by my non-registered accounts. This month, given the run in the US stock market of late, that involved a sale of some shares of HXS1.

Plan for the next month

The asset-class split looks like this

The bond portion of the portfolio is a little smaller than I would like. The targets for my portfolio are unchanged:

  • 5% cash or cash-like holdings like ICSH and ZMMK
  • 15% bonds (almost all are buried in XGRO and AOA)
  • 20% Canadian equity (mostly based on ETFs that mirror the S&P/TSX 60)
  • 36% US equity (dominated by ETFs that mirror the S&P 500, with a small sprinkling of Russell 2000)
  • 24% International equity (mostly, but not exclusively, developed markets)

The change in the bond portion of the portfolio was amplified because I hadn’t updated the asset split of AOA in my multi-asset tracker in a while. AOA has drifted quite a bit since it only rebalances twice a year (next time in October). More on drifting in multi-asset ETFs here.

Overall

The retirement savings look quite healthy; even though I’ve been drawing a monthly salary for 7 months, I’m now ahead of where I was when I started my retirement journey. This is aligned with what my retirement planner told me to expect, but as you can see, the journey has had some interesting ups and downs already.

Monthly retirement savings, as percentage of Jan 2025 value

My VPW-calculated salary has hit a new high this year, a dizzying 0.77% higher than my first draw in January. This stability is thanks to the built-in shock-absorber of the VPW model (a 6-month cash cushion which smooths out the market gyrations considerably). I also think it’s an endorsement of my choice to take retirement payments monthly; my exposure to short-term market hiccups is greatly reduced since I’m not making big sales of ETFs to fund a year of spending all at once.

Monthly salary, as percentage of Jan 2025 salary
  1. Which particular ETF I sell from my non-registered portfolio is based on what asset class is the most overweight at that point in time. If it’s US Equity, then I sell US Equity. If it’s Canadian Equity, then I sell Canadian Equity. ↩︎

What’s in my retirement portfolio (June 2025)

RobH4 Comments

This is a (hopefully1 monthly) look at what’s in my retirement portfolio. The original post is here. Last month’s is here.

Portfolio Construction

The retirement portfolio is spread across a bunch of accounts2:

  • 7 RRIF accounts (3 for me, 3 for my spouse, 1 at an alternative provider as a test)
  • 2 TFSA accounts
  • 4 non-registered accounts, (1 for me, 1 for my spouse, 2 joint)

The target for the overall portfolio is unchanged:

  • 80% equity, spread across Canadian, US and global markets for maximum diversification
  • 15% Bond funds, from a variety of Canadian, US and global markets
  • 5% cash, held in savings-like ETFs.

You can read about my asset-allocation approach to investing over here.

The view as of this morning

As of this morning, this is what the overall portfolio looks like:

Retirement holdings by ETF, June 2025

The portfolio is dominated by my ETF all-stars; anything not on that page is held in a non-registered account and won’t be fiddled with unless it’s part of my monthly decumulation. Otherwise I’ll rack up capital gains for no real benefit.

The biggest changes over the last 30 days was due to a small rebalancing exercise I executed. I sold off some AOA in order to pick up more ICSH. The stock market has been roaring lately, and it caused my target allocations to become a bit cash-poor; ICSH is not, strictly speaking, “cash”, but for my purposes, it’s close enough. (You can read about my cash thoughts here). I could have instead sold XGRO to pick up more ZMMK, but US interest rates are a lot better than Canadian ones at the moment, so I figured I’d enjoy the extra few percentage points of return on my cash holdings.

Plan for the next month

The asset-class split looks like this

This looks to be pretty close to my target percentages which haven’t changed:

  • 5% cash or cash-like holdings like ICSH and ZMMK
  • 15% bonds (almost all are buried in XGRO and AOA)
  • 20% Canadian equity (mostly based on ETFs that mirror the S&P/TSX 60)
  • 36% US equity (dominated by ETFs that mirror the S&P 500, with a small sprinkling of Russell 2000)
  • 24% International equity (mostly, but not exclusively, developed markets)

The pie is looking almost perfect at the moment. I don’t see any near-term need for fiddling with what’s there.

Overall

The retirement savings look quite healthy; even though I’ve been drawing a monthly salary for 6 months, I’m now ahead of where I was3 when I started my retirement journey. This is aligned with what my retirement planner told me to expect, but as you can see, the journey has had some interesting ups and downs aready.

Monthly retirement savings, as percentage of Jan 2025 value

My VPW-calculated salary has gone back to more or less where I started at the beginning of the year. And even with the crazy market swings we’ve seen, it’s stayed remarkably stable4. That’s thanks to the built-in shock-absorber of the VPW model (a 6-month cash cushion which smooths out the market gyrations considerably). I also think it’s an endorsement of my choice to take retirement payments monthly; my exposure to short-term market hiccups is greatly reduced since I’m not making big sales of ETFs to fund a year of spending all at once.

Monthly salary, as percentage of Jan 2025 salary

  1. I know it’s July 7, but the numbers are accurate for June, more or less. ↩︎
  2. I treat retirement savings as firewalled from my day to day chequing account. ↩︎
  3. Just barely, but I’ll take it ↩︎
  4. I changed the vertical axis of this chart to align with the other chart; it makes its stability much clearer. ↩︎