NSSC Blog: Before You Invest

Question of the week: What is a hedge fund?

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Hedge funds have been easy fodder for Hollywood over the years, frequently appearing in movies (Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and The Big Short) and TV shows (Billions) that have some aspects of finance or wealth attached to the plot. The term hedge fund is bantered around a lot, but that doesn’t mean the average investor has any idea what they actually are. If their only introduction to a hedge fund is through the entertainment it’s highly likely they know very little about them at all.

Question of the week: What is an investment fund manager?

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We conclude our walk through the categories of registration with a look at investment fund managers. As the name would suggest an investment fund managers manages a fund. It could be a mutual fund, exchange-traded fund (ETF), or some other kind of investment fund.

The manager is responsible for implementing a fund’s investment strategy and managing its portfolio activities. This can include analyzing financial statements, selection of assets, selection of stocks, plan implementation and ongoing monitoring of the fund’s investments.

Question of the week: What is a portfolio manager?

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 Our look at the categories of registration resumes this week with a look at portfolio managers. A portfolio manager is a firm or individual member of a firm that manages an investor’s portfolio on their behalf. This includes choosing what investments to buy, sell and hold for the investor. To do so they must be given discretionary authority from the investor.

Question of the week: What is a scholarship plan dealer?

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At the Nova Scotia Securities Commission, we regularly get questions about categories of registration. This includes questions surrounding what the categories are, and what they allow a person to offer and not offer. Instead of rolling out a lengthy post running down all of the categories of registration we’ve decided to split it up and highlight one each week for the next month. Today we’ll start with scholarship plan dealers.

Question of the week: What is SEDAR?

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SEDAR stands for System for Electronic Document Analysis and Retrieval. You can see why we needed an acronym. Found online at www.sedar.com, SEDAR is administered by the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) and operated by the Alberta Securities Commission (ASC). SEDAR is the electronic system used by public companies and investment funds to officially file documents. This fulfills three objectives:

Question of the week: What is the CSA?

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We have mentioned the CSA in some of our older blog posts, but it dawned on us the other day that we’ve never explicitly detailed who and what the CSA is.

The Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) is made up of the securities regulators in Canada’s 10 provinces and three territories. That includes the Nova Scotia Securities Commission. The CSA’s primary responsibility is to develop a harmonized approach to securities regulation across Canada.

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