A Comment -- General Comments From an Expert (A Commentary)

Calendar Spread is a time premium collection strategy. Ideally the stock should be in a consolidation phase. You want it to be in a sideways trading pattern, not running up or running down. You also have to worry whether the stock is assignable to you because of your option come expiration.

Gold: He is very bullish on gold. Inflation will come back and this will be a hedge. Feels gold will become more and more of a currency alternative. (His approach is to split equally between iUnits Gold (XGD-T) and gold/silver bullion.)

Canadian $: Very bullish on the Canadian$. It's a debt to GDP story. Canada has gone into this situation well positioned.

Stop Losses: In this environment and given the volatility, stop losses worked like they probably never have before. Probably less effective now than they were last fall. You could lose a position that is good value but you could buy back in again.

Canadian Banks: Dividends are all relatively high with Bank of Montreal (BMO-T) paying the highest. His favourites are Toronto Dominion (TD-T) and Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS-T). If there was a broad nationalization of US banks and the equity went away, it might drag ours down a little.

The best way to invest in the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) is to do it through an index.

Natural Gas: Hard to believe that gas would be at $4. Fundamentals are pretty positive. One negative is a rumour that there has been a significantly large shale find in the US. Gas drawdowns have been very close to the 5-year average. Until oil prices start to firm up he doesn't think gas has got a lot of legs.

Canadian$: Had a roller coaster ride for the last couple of years. Canadian economy is very much connected to the US so there won't be a stronger dollar until we see some stabilization in the US. Also the dollar is influenced by commodity prices. Expects oil prices to bottom and rebound within the next few months so there will be relative strength coming to the dollar.

Gold: In the next 6 to 12 months believes gold will continue to climb higher because it is a hedge against the US$. However, it has had a very good run in the last little while and is expecting a correction in the near term. Would delay purchasing of gold stocks for a little while.

TSX: Started the year at 9200 and is now below 8000, about an 11% drop. He believes in a recovery in the economy about the 4th quarter. He also sees commodities, especially oil prices, recovering by midyear. Looking for the TSX to being flat or 5%-10% higher than the start of the year, 9700 to 10,000.

Oil: If he were going to do anything, he would probably look at an integrated, not a producer. Where the oil price will be in 2 years is a $64,000 question. He is not going to fight the trend.

US Banks: His strategy is all about buying the leader. You want the absolute best companies in sectors that have come out of favour. He has small stakes in Goldman Sachs (GS-N) and Morgan Stanley (MS-N), which stand a very good chance of coming out of this in the right end. Thinks there will be some nationalization. When that occurs, it will be destabilizing and a lot of equity stakeholders will lose their money.

Canadian Bank Bonds: Bubble? Could be one if we are going into an inflationary period but that would mean corporate balance sheets are doing better. He thinks there is deflation. For the next 6 to 9 months he thinks they are stellar relative to global banks but they are facing tremendous headwinds but a great place to hide. Still getting higher on the capital structure but yields aren't as compelling as they were 2 months ago.

My apologies. For some reason,last night's BNN didn't get totally recorded on my computer. Their website only had 8 minutes recorded for the regular program, excluding Top Picks. Checked again today but it's still only 8 minutes so there are a few stocks and comments missed.

Precious Metals: Usually owned as a defence so you have to be aware of the party that is issuing the paper, as you may not actually own the physical metal. Because of counter party risks you have to be aware of the party that is issuing the paper.