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Custom Indexing.Remix the markets.Only at Questrade.
Turn a basic index into one that fully matches any theme or investing strategy. Keep its growth on track with built-in automation and rebalancing tools.
Three days to reflect. $70,000 to reset. One winner.
The best decisions happen when you have room to think and the means to act. This summer, win both. Create a Custom Index by July 15 for a chance to win $70,000 of TFSA contributions and an all-expenses-paid retreat to Nimmo Bay.
Custom Indexing is a new self-directed investing product that lets you build, own, and manage your portfolio through an index, rather than buying a fund that holds and manages it for you. Start from a broad-market or thematic index and edit it by stock or sector, buy in, and keep it on track with one click rebalancing.
You can open a Custom Indexing account through the regular account opening process. Once you select your account type, you’ll be presented with a screen that asks what you would like to use the new account for, of which there is an option to select Custom Indexing.
Custom Indexing uses a dedicated account so that features like one-click rebalancing and drift notifications work accurately across all your holdings. This keeps your index self-contained—your other investments won't be affected when you rebalance, and your index performance stays clean.
When you buy an ETF, you own a share of a pooled fund. You can’t edit what's inside, and you pay management fees (MERs) every year. With Custom Indexing, you own the actual stocks directly as fractional shares. You decide what's in and what's out, with no MERs.
Robo-advisors build a portfolio for you based on a questionnaire. It's convenient, but the allocation is determined by their algorithms—not your preferences. With Custom Indexing, you control the portfolio. You choose the stocks, set the weights, and adjust whenever you want.
No. It’s a similar concept, but a different execution. Direct indexing is usually available as a managed product for non-registered accounts, managed by an advisor or an algorithm, and is focused on tax optimization. Custom Indexing is a fully self-directed product, designed to make diversified portfolio management seamless, and is available for TFSA, RRSP, FHSA, and cash account types.
To start investing with Custom Indexing you’ll need to open a Custom Indexing account. Custom Indexing is available for TFSA, RRSP, or FHSA, and Cash accounts. It is not available for Margin, RESP, or joint account types. From there, you can start building your index from our template library, edit it to your preferences, and execute your portfolio—all in one session.
Ensure you have a Custom Indexing account first. Once its open, check that it is assigned to the index you want to buy into. You can check this by going to your Custom Indexing account. To buy in, fund your account and add your funds to your index, the funds in your account won’t be automatically applied to your index.
Yes, you can edit your index at any time. Editing is just as easy as building, and when you’re done you can apply the changes to your portfolio in one click.
Fractional shares of every stock in your index will be bought for you, weighted exactly the way you set it. Your custom index is live and held in your account.
When you start creating a Custom Index you can choose from two types of templates, market indices or those contributed by community. Under Market Indices, you can choose from three broad market templates with broad exposure to the top 100, 200, and 500 US companies. Under Community Indices, you can choose from templates contributed by the Questrade community, represent different investing ideas and theses.
When you edit by stock or sector, you can adjust the percent weighting of an individual stock or sector, like Technology, or remove it altogether. You can filter by sector to understand it’s makeup and adjust the percentages within it. When you remove a stock or change the weighting of a sector, your index scales around it. When you’re done, scale your edits to add up to 100% in one click, and save your changes.
Custom Indexing operates off of fractional shares. Our platform supports US securities only (with Canadian fractional shares on the way!).
There are no management fees or trading commissions charged for using Custom Indexing. All indexes are held in US dollars, so FX fees still apply.
There is a $10 minimum buy in.
No. Rebalancing alerts will notify you when your index drifts by 10% from your target weights. When that happens, log in to review your orders and bring everything back with one click.
It depends on the account type.
If simplicity at tax time matters to you, a registered Custom Indexing account is the most straightforward option. For registered accounts (TFSA, RRSP, FHSA), there's no capital gains tax, so ACB tracking and tax reporting aren't a factor.
In a non-registered cash account, each rebalance can trigger sells across hundreds of positions, and every one is a separate taxable event with its own ACB calculation to track. We're building features to simplify ACB tracking and tax reporting for Custom Indexing accounts ahead of next tax season, and exploring additional ways to make tax filing easier.
You can create multiple indices and run different strategies in each. There is no limit to the number of indexes someone can draft and hold. Each index will require at least one new account to buy in, where the funds in each Custom Indexing account can only be applied toward one index.
As your index grows over time, we’ll let you know when it’s drifted more than 10% away from your original settings. When that happens, you’ll receive a push or email notification letting you know your index is off balance. When you log in, we’ll have an order summary ready for you to bring it back into balance. Confirm the orders in one click, and we’ll handle all the buying and selling.
You choose. You can keep your dividends as cash in your account, or you can make it so dividends are reinvested automatically, keeping your returns compounding. Dividend reinvestment needs to be activated on the account level once your Custom Indexing account is open.
Custom Indexing is its own account creation option at Questrade. You choose to have a Custom Indexing account the same way you’d choose to do self-directed investing instead of getting a managed portfolio. Its enabled in any registered account, like a TFSA, RRSP, or FHSA, as well as a Cash account. You can’t do Custom Indexing in a Margin account.
Custom Indexing will soon be available for indexes like the TSX.
You can’t do an “in-kind” transfer (moving the exact portfolio over into a Custom Indexing account), but you can liquidate your assets and move them over the the Custom Indexing account, where you can design the portfolio you want.
No more so than any other kind of investing. Custom Indexing gives you more control, and means your outcomes depend on your decisions. If you're unsure, consider starting with a template and making small adjustments.
You can edit your index anytime. Remove a stock you regret adding, adjust a weight that feels off, or rebalance to correct a drift. Your opinions are allowed (and encouraged) to evolve over time. Custom Indexing was made with that in mind. Iteration is built in, and available anytime.
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