In August, the S&P/TSX, S&P 500, and MSCI ACWI ex USA increased by 1.2%, 2.4%, and 2.9%, respectively.
At the end of the 12-month period ending August 30, the S&P/TSX increased by 18.8%, the S&P 500 performed best with a growth of 27.1%, while the MSCI ACWI ex USA increased by 18.8%.
The NQICAT monthly performance showed a slight decline of -0.1%, while it grew by 25.6% on an annual basis.
The best TSX sectors for August were Financials, up 2.8%, Information Technology, up 2.4%, and Utilities, up 1.8%.
The worst-performing sectors were Health Care, Energy, and Consumer Staples, down 3.8%, 2.2%, and 1.6%, respectively.
The best monthly performers in NQICAT were the National Bank of Canada, up 7.9%, the Royal Bank of Canada, up 6.6%, and RB Global Inc, up 5.6%.
Conversely, the weakest contributors were Alimentation Couche-Tard, down 9.6%, TFI International, down 7.2%, and goeasy Ltd, down 6.7%.
August Transactions in the U.S. Portfolio
There were two transactions in our Stockpointer U.S. model portfolio.
We sold The Cigna Group (CI) mainly due to its lower SP score compared to other financial stocks in the sector. We added Berkley (W.R.) Corp (WRB) due to its high ranking in terms of SP score among financial stocks.
Additionally, we sold Celanese Corporation (CE) due to a market trend favoring Consumer Staples over Materials. It was the only Materials stock in the strategy. To replace it, we bought Philip Morris International Inc (PM), which ranks highly in the Consumer Staples sector in terms of SP score.
