The Canadian Investor - 3 Things to Do Before You Invest a Single Dollar

Episode Date: December 1, 2025

Before you start investing, there are a few fundamentals every Canadian needs to get right — but most people skip straight past them. In this episode, Simon and Dan lay out a simple framework to follow before you consider investing a single dollar in the markets. Then, Simon sits down with Dan Broten, Senior Vice President and Head of EQ Bank, for a deep dive into the state of Canadian banking. They discuss EQ’s new survey on solopreneurs and micro-businesses, why small operators feel overlooked by traditional banks, and how outdated, branch-era systems still shape the experience for business owners today. Dan also shares insights on regulatory change, pro-competition momentum in Ottawa, and why Canada might finally be at a turning point in modernizing its financial infrastructure. Check out our portfolio by going to Jointci.com Our Website Our New Youtube Channel! Canadian Investor Podcast Network Twitter: @cdn_investing Simon’s twitter: @Fiat_Iceberg Braden’s twitter: @BradoCapital Dan’s Twitter: @stocktrades_ca Want to learn more about Real Estate Investing? Check out the Canadian Real Estate Investor Podcast! Apple Podcast - The Canadian Real Estate Investor  Spotify - The Canadian Real Estate Investor  Web player - The Canadian Real Estate Investor Asset Allocation ETFs | BMO Global Asset Management Sign up for Fiscal.ai for free to get easy access to global stock coverage and powerful AI investing tools. Register for EQ Bank, the seamless digital banking experience with better rates and no nonsense.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Investing is simple, but don't confuse that with thinking it's easy. A sock is not just a ticker. At the end of the day, you have to remember that it's a business. Just my reminder to people who own cyclicals, don't be surprised when. there's a cycle. If there's uncertainty in the markets, there's going to be some great opportunities for investors. This has to be one of the biggest quarters I've seen from this company in quite some time. Welcome back to the Canadian investor podcast. I'm Simone Berengen back with Dan Kent. We are back for a regular episode. And for this episode, because it is financial literacy month in November, we wanted to do an episode

in the spirit of that month. So we've been thinking about it for a while where we thought it would be useful to do an episode on the three things to do before you start investing. And more investing as a self-directed investor on your own because I think a lot of these three steps sometimes are skipped by people.

And if you've been investing for a while, I think it still can be useful for you because I'm sure with the new year coming, you'll have friends or family, especially if they know that you're, investing that will ask you how do I start to invest, right? I get that a whole lot of time. I don't know about you. I'm sure you do as well. And I think these three things we'll talk about are must before you consider investing because if you don't, you'll probably end up hurting your returns because

you may end up being forced to sell by not doing these three things here. Yeah, and I would argue you, like if you have been investing, but you aren't doing these things, then you probably, you know, it's not only for people who are just looking to start. It's probably for people who've been doing it, but maybe haven't been following those, especially these, sorry, especially the first two. Yeah. There's some, there's some situations where like your investment portfolio might be doing well, but you're doing other things that have effectively wiped out the returns of those. So yeah, it should be a pretty good episode. Exactly. And before we get started, just a little housekeeping at the end of, uh, of Dan and I's discussion. We'll have a special guest. So I did an interview with another Dan, Dan Broughton. It seems everyone I meet that's kind of new is Dan. Like I know a whole lot of people. Yeah, very popular name. So Dan Broughton is the SVP and head of VQ Bank. So he came on, really enjoyed the conversation with Dan. They did a survey from from small, actually micro business owners and solopreneurs. So basically those very small businesses in Canada, I think it's typically less than 10 employees

because small businesses do go up over 99 employees and they did a survey and there's some really interesting takeaways that Dan and I discussed. So people will, I think, enjoy the interview. Clearly, QBank is one of our sponsors but it was a really insightful survey.

Dan can't hear you know as well. You have a small business too. The challenges you face as a small business owner or a micro business, they're very different than what you see in the news, especially with trade tariff. and everything happening right now on the macroeconomic front. So a really interesting discussion.

I encourage people to stay for the back half where I have that interview with Dan Broughton from EQ Bank. Now, Dan Kent, let's get started. So I'll kind of do the big outlines here and feel free to chime in at the end. So the first one I think everyone should do this before they start investing is pay down high interest debt. I would put anything 6% or more in this category. I think that's a good baseline. Do you agree with that assessment? 6% as a threshold?

Okay. And some might ask why 6%. They may say, you know what? I can earn at least 8% by investing the SMP 500 and probably even the SMP TX. So why should I not do that since I would get more returns than repaying that debt quickly? And that's a valid point. but there's a few problems with that. First, those returns are not guaranteed.

If you pay down a debt that's 6% or more, whatever the percentage is, those are guaranteed returns that you're getting. And sure, over long periods of time, the SMP 500 has returned more than 8%, but the reality is that doesn't guarantee first that those will be the returns going forward. There's actually some strong arguments to be made

that there's a whole lot of pulled forward growth, so you could see shallower returns in the next two, three, five, ten years. And the second issue here is that even if you achieve those returns, they are very volatile. So you could very well have a drawdown of 20% next year and then have a return of 30% the following year, then 10% the following year. But the average over a long period of time is 8%. But it doesn't eliminate the volatility of returns issue, which can create some problems,

depending if you have an emergency fund or not, and we will get to that on our second point here. And maybe to add to this, if the debt is between 4 and 6%, then maybe you can do a combination. Maybe you can consider investing and paying down that debt. So you pay it down, obviously may always make the minimum payments. But when I say pay down, typically I'll just mean try to speed up the repayment. Maybe you can do a combination of both here, if the debts between 4 and 6. And if it's less than 4%, then I think it's more of a personal basis at that point is maybe consider paying it down if you're very indebted. So you have a lot of debt at that 4%, 5%, but if you don't have a large quantity of debt and it's very manageable and it's a low interest rate, then you can maybe focus a bit more on investing.

Yeah, I think we've probably been spoiled over the last like 15 plus years of market returns. So a lot of people think they can probably carry margin debt or like higher interest debt and probably, you know, achieve higher returns in the market. I mean, realistically, there's, you never really know when we're going to get a dead five years. And that doesn't even necessarily mean the markets have to crash. They could just go flat for a little bit and then you're carrying this debt. I mean, I know plenty of people. I mean, I guess I don't want to say plenty. I've known a few that have actually carried credit card debt and still invested.

I mean, again, you're earning 8% of the market by paying like. like a 24% APR on your credit card. This is kind of what I meant at the start of the episode where you're seeing your investment portfolio go up, but the actual money you have is going down. And I know I actually had showed you that tweet. It was a while ago that guy who paid off his 2.5% mortgage in the States. Oh, yeah.

Like he had a 30-year, two and a half percent mortgage. I mean, from a financial perspective, especially, you know, because you can get four, plus percent on U.S. Treasuries, it doesn't really make sense to pay down that debt. But as you mentioned, like, a lot of it is, is personal. I'm kind of one who tends to go move towards the best financial side of things. Like, I would never pay off two and a half percent debt, especially when you can get

four percent risk free. But ultimately, that's, that's kind of up to you. No, exactly. And I think we were talking about, I'm like, yeah, my, my parents did that. So they had a small mortgage remaining on their condo. and my mom, who's the accountant and the family, I was explaining to her the math and she's very smart when it comes to math. So she fully understood. But she's like, you know what? I always wanted to be mortgage free. And it was a very small mortgage, to be fair, would have been probably

a difference of maybe $1,500 in the end, $1,500, not a huge amount. So I'm like, you know what? If makes you feel better at night, sorry, sleep better at night, that's worth more than money. So they ended up paying the mortgage. So I can definitely understand, probably. would have, you know, try to convince them otherwise if it was a really large amount. But at the end of the day, we invest to keep up our purchasing power over time. And, you know, you invest so you can do things that you enjoy. And ultimately, you invest in part to, you know, to be happy to be able to have that at least base level that enables you to play golf, to spend time with your kids, to do all these things that bring you enjoyment in life. And if it makes you

happier to pay off that debt than who am I to argue with that? Yeah. I mean, I would love to be mortgage free, but it's just it's the only other thing I guess I'll say is like in Canada, I don't know what you're getting outside of a mortgage that's less than 4%. Like I know in the States, obviously you get that 30 year term, but there's not very much debt you can take on right now that may be a new vehicle, but even then it's. Yeah, no, you're right. No, that's definitely true. cash on hand is essential for any business. Traditional business accounts hit you with high fees while paying little to no interest on the cash you need for day-to-day operations. That was our experience too, until we switch to the new EQ Bank business account. Now, every dollar earns high

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thinking about taking a short trip from Ottawa to Quebec City for the winter carnival. My wife and I spent our honeymoon there a few years ago, so it will always have a special meaning for us. And now, with my daughter, she'll also get a chance to appreciate how great Quebec City is. She'll be able to practice speaking French, and I can already picture her lighting up when she sees the ice sculptures or tries snow tubing for the first time. After a full day of activities, I can imagine us heading back to our home away from home on Airbnb, making a warm dinner, maybe picking up some local pastries for dessert and just winding down playing some board games with a nice glass of red wine. It got me thinking about hosting our own place.

While we'd be away, our home could give another family the chance to enjoy winter loot in Ottawa as it will just be sitting empty while we are away. The nice part is we get to decide when our place is available and it lets us make a little extra to put towards our next trip instead of having our place just sit empty. your home might be worth more than you think find out how much at a Airbnb.ca slash host this second thing you should do before investing I referenced it an emergency fund so having an emergency fund I think is a must before you start investing it's pretty simple if you don't have an emergency fund and you have unexpected expenses that come up where are you going to get that

money to pay for it. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if you have investments, you're probably going to have to sell those investments. And it's fine if you're in an up market or raging bull market and you're selling at all-time highs or close to it or you're up 50% and you're selling. That's not a bad feeling. But the reality is you're a force seller. And if you're in the middle of a correction, you could be selling at a loss or at really a low, even if you're still making a profit. And that's something you really never want to be in a position when you invest is being a forced seller. It doesn't mean you should never sell, but ideally you have a good plan for selling. Sometimes it could be a really good company. And I know Dan, we've talked about

a few of your investments that have really run up recently and could be a really good company that is just probably trading a bit ahead of itself right now. And you decide, you know, I'm going to trim that position, sell a little bit. That, to me, is a very sensible way to do it. It's actually very prudent, really good risk management to be able to trim those positions. But you're doing it, you're selling into strength. So you're doing, and you're not forced to do it. And I think that's where it's really important to have that emergency fund.

Anything you want to add before I go and explain like an easy way to build an emergency fund? No, I guess what I would say is, again, it goes back to the high interest debt. we've kind of been spoiled by 15 plus years of like a raging bowl market. So a lot of people probably don't think they need this because, you know, the market has gone up pretty consistently. But I mean, I, like I will admit, I never did this. I never had an emergency fund. And I just never really needed to utilize it. I guess I got lucky in that regard. And now with my business, I just kind of have money in there in case I need to to tap into it. But it's, it's a very good idea. I kind of had access to credit that I would have used if I had to, which is not the

best idea. I mean, you definitely want some sort of rainy day fund for sure. Yeah. So forget about everything Dan just said. Listen to me. Don't listen to him. Yes. Don't listen to me. Listen to Simone. Yeah. Yeah. So I do have an emergency fund. And as you were saying that, I thought a good cold neck came to me and I'm sure people have heard it before. Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth or in the face. And I just so happened, I never got punched in the mouth, but I very easily could have. Yeah, exactly. So it just goes. to show yes, you may have a good plan of selling those investments without an emergency fund until you get punched in the face by the market and liberation day happens and you happen

to need the money right around Trump is showing off his little chart in the Rose Garden or wherever it was. So that's just, it is a recent example here. Now, first to get started about creating an emergency fund, I think the best way to do it is just to do it gradually. Clearly, if you're starting to invest, you probably don't have a large sum of money to set aside as an emergency fund. So the first step to do is figure out how much money you need. Typically, you'll want between three and six months of expenses. That will depend on your lifestyle where you're at. But first, you'll have to do a budget. You can use some of the apps that are out there that you can connect your bank accounts. You can also just use a spreadsheet and look at

your expenses by looking at your bank accounts and in credit cards if you have some make sure you factor in expenses that do happen regularly but they may not be a monthly expense either one that comes to mine everyone who has a car will well a non-ev car will have to do an oil change for example tire change unless you do those yourself i don't i get you know i pay someone to do them so they do happen typically for me twice a year so i would just average that out on a monthly basis just to be part of my budget. And then you have to figure out, do I need three, four, five, six months worth of an emergency fund?

You'll have to use your judgment on that, but typically the more stable your income and your expenses are, the lower you can go. If you and your spouse, for example, both have corporate or government jobs, you rent, you don't have kids, then you're probably going to be okay at three months. That's probably save there. If you own in your business and have a home, so you're a homeowner, and you may have some unexpected maintenance to do in your own, which you don't have when you're renting, well, then maybe six months makes a bit more sense, especially being a business owner.

Your earnings could be a bit more lumpy, not as stable as a corporate or government job, and obviously anywhere in between. So the easiest way to build that emergency fund is to do it on an automated basis. So just had a bit of money every pay automatically. to a high savings account. That's the easiest way to do it. High interest savings account. And like those offered by our great sponsor at EQBank,

they typically have some of the highest rates there. And you do that until you reach a desired amount. Now, a high interest savings account is a great option because you ensure that the dollar is liquid when you need it. Now, there's other ways to do it if you're looking to get more interest. We have talked about that in the past an episode on, fixed income. So there are trade-offs. Oftentimes, it's liquidity, so it'll take you a bit more time to get access to that money. Some, it might be a few days, like some it might be a month,

even more, depending on the type of account, but you do, you trade off some instant liquidity for higher yield. So keep that in mind, but let's keep it simple here and just leave it to Haisa. Anything else you wanted to add there then? No, that's it. So the last one here, again, if you're a solopreneur or you have a micro business, then you likely will just want to skip to the interview with Dan Broughton here. But the last one here is maximize your employer matching. So this is really important. This is essentially free money you're getting from your employer.

And as exciting as it might be to pick your own stocks or pick your own ETFs because some of these employer matching programs, like an employer matching RSPs or a defined contribution pension, which is similar to RSP matching but usually you'll have a set of funds that are pre-set by the employer and you can pick from them usually 10 to 15 is kind of the typical amount of funds.

You should definitely maximize the employer matching before you start investing your personal account. RSP matching, I think you may have the option to do individual companies that might be in your own brokerage account. I'm not sure, but even if it's a DC pension, usually what your employer will do will say something like for every dollar you contribute will give you an extra 25 cents so that would be 25% returns that you get in terms of the

matching right there and I've seen some employers and my former employer was actually much more generous they started at 1.25% of your matching so if you did a dollar they contributed a dollar 25 instead of 25 cent. So what you're essentially getting is just free money. And the way to see it is you're just getting like additional returns on the money you contribute. And it would be completely foolish to not maximize that. And usually they'll do it to a maximum, whether it's a maximum of your salary. So you could say you're making $100,000 a year. They might say we'll match up to 5% of your contributions worth of your salary. So that would be $5,000. Let's say they do let's say super generous. They do one for one. So you'll do five. They'll do five. And then after that,

they stop matching. Then after that amount, you can start putting money aside in your investment accounts. Yeah, actually, this is actually how I bought my first house was with the RSP matching when I was younger. So I, like, I was young enough that and didn't make all that much. So the RSP was definitely not the most beneficial account for me to use. I probably would have been much better putting into my TFSA, but my employer would match up to 6%. So I would put in... What was it matching? Like it was, so if you put 6% of your salary into RSP, they'd match you 6.

So I would put... Oh, one for one. So I would put 12. They would put to 6 and I maxed out my RSPs every year. And then eventually it was after probably three or four years, I just used the first time home buyer, like withdrawal from the RSP and ended up being able to put, you know, money down on a home. Like I obviously I contributed at the lowest bracket when I pull that money out when I retire.

It'll be at the lowest bracket as well. But the matching, I mean, easily offset the taxable benefits, especially because it got me into a home when I was 22 or 23. So yeah, this is huge. Like if you're not doing this, you should be, unless in like very rare, you know, circumstances where the tax benefits don't work out for you. But I'm going to argue it probably will for most. Yeah, exactly.

That's exactly it. Even if you, it would probably make. make most sense to invest in a TFSA because you're not in a high enough tax bracket right now. Just the fact that your employer is matching it will more than offset that. So you just have to keep that in mind. It's literally your employer. We're going to give you free money. The only thing you have to do is you have to put money in as well.

So it would be foolish for me, like for people to to not do that. If you don't do it, if you're not maximizing, you, I'm sorry, but you should not be investing. Yeah. Like these are basic, this is something very basic. Like it's super basic. You have to run the math. Sure, you might not be able to buy Bitcoin in that account or buy whichever stock that you want, that's fine.

But for you to be able to match the returns that you get in terms of free money from your employer will be extremely difficult. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, they were giving me three, four thousand bucks a year just in matching. So it was, yeah, which again, like earned returns. They weren't, yeah, you had to buy like mutual funds. I mean, I was very young back then, like just, just starting. Even mutual funds, right?

Even if they charge you 1.5 percent, I mean, if you're getting 1%, you're one for one, you're getting 100% matching. Yeah. Like, I mean, even with high fees, as soon as you can transfer out, you transfer it out, but even with high fees, it's hard to argue that you wouldn't do that. And nowadays, they tend to have better fees. I was working in that space. And I don't think all employers are like that, but they had below pretty much 25 basis points. So below 0.25% all the options. Yeah. It's a no brainer, I think. No. So that that's it for Dan and I, Dan can't deny. I think this was a fun short episode. Again, for some of you, it may be stuff that you're already doing. And if that's the case, that's perfect. But if you know someone that's wanting to invest, especially young.

younger people, people that may have a little bit of debt or not yet an emergency fund, I think this is the basic of the three things you need to do before you consider investing in a self-directed account. You need to have these things in order because if not, you could really put yourself in a tough spot or really not maximize the returns on your money. So I hope you enjoy this. Now, I'll be coming back with Dan Broughton and with a really interesting discussion. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did really enjoy the discussion with Dan. Welcome to the Canadian investor podcast. My name is Simone Beranger.

I'm here with Dan Broughton from EQ Bank, so senior vice president and head of EQBank. I'm very excited to have you on the show, Dan. Welcome to the podcast. It's your first time here. Well, happy to be here, Simone. Thank you for having me. Really excited to jump into the topics today. Yeah, exactly.

Maybe if just before we get started, if you can give just maybe a few minutes elevator pitch in terms of your background, how you got to EQ Bank. I was reading a little bit your profile, but I think it will be better coming from you. Absolutely. So I started working in consulting and banking, a lot of the bigger institutions in Canada, safe to the border, a little bit global stuff, and left all that to go do like startups and fintech. And it was during that tour where I'd left kind of the bigger institution.

And so they had the opportunity to create what's become the EQBank. That was part of the founding team about 12 years ago, 11, 12 years ago now that had the opportunity of kind of imagining what EQBank could be become. And it's surpassed all the ideas we had over the last decade and more. And so we had the opportunity to grow with the company from kind of a technology lens and now more of a product and business management lens for the digital bank. Okay. So we're the seventh largest bank now. So, I mean, things have changed quite a bit. Yeah. And I must say, like one of our last questions, so we prepared some topics. And of course, it's going to focus a bit more on the EQ Bank survey that was released about solo entrepreneurs, but also micro entrepreneurs, I guess businesses, nine employees or less. And I definitely want to also touch on the subject of disruption with EQ Bank, being at your entrance in the banking space.

but we'll focus on the survey first. So can you tell us a bit more about what that survey found? I found it pretty interesting because our podcast is a business and we definitely fall within that group. And it is definitely true that some of the things mentioned the survey and I'm sure to elaborate is we tend to get lumped in with small businesses that go up to 99 employees. And, you know, very well, that's very different from 9 to 99 or 2 to 99. Oh, absolutely. And we found that fundamentally part of our product design and why this area is interesting for us. And maybe I'll talk a bit about the survey first. Like these small businesses, as you said, they often get lumped in with like anywhere up to 99 employees, sometimes more even. And when you're really starting that early phase of creating a company and trying to add some innovation or differentiation to Canada and the economy, you need a different type of solution when you start at that type of scale. and that type of size. And we found that a lot of the,

I mean, this is something I'll mention repeatedly as we chat this morning, but most of the products and services in Canada today were designed 50 years ago for a branch-based world, very different economy, and the digitization of those in the last,

I'll say, 25 years, have really been keeping those same product designs and solutions and just adding a mobile experience to them. They actually haven't really adjusted to this new modern economy that we have in front of us and the needs of smaller businesses. And so some of the things we saw in this survey is that like 51% of those solopreneurs that we surveyed said that the current global trade environment is hitting their business just as hard after the pandemic. They're still having a very difficult time

to kind of drive their business forward and grow. And some of that that pain point is really emphasized more in like the lack of vision that they think they have a good opportunity for their financial future. So they worry about that quite a lot, something like 24%. So one and four are very, very worried about their future. So this is the oblique starting point for a lot of these companies who are not only trying to sustain what they have, but they're really trying to grow and like break out and get into becoming a larger business.

And what we see from kind of the financial strain part of this is, they don't really feel recognized or seen as a business because they're so small and because they're operating a bit differently. They're so early stage. And that lack of recognition does impact kind of their confidence. But they also don't have a lot of solutions generally in market to support them. And I think that's the thing you're mentioning before someone on. Like, as the early pilot user of our small business offering,

like these are the types of feedback and points that we really took to heart as we were designing and thinking about, like, How do we solve these problems? How do we actually provide a better solution that's going to help people both in the early stages of their business, but also as they grow and start to mature? And that's a lot of the same principles and ethos we've had on the retail banking side. Yeah, I mean, just from personal experience with the podcast starting our bank account, so with one of the large incumbents, because obviously we went on to the testing the beta phase

for the business account with DQ Bank and just how painful it was, just having to, you have to first do it, part of it online, and then oftentimes you talk to someone on the phone and then you have to go in person. I also found that I was more knowledgeable than a lot of the people I was talking to it is a little bit frustrating at times. But just the whole process, I think I must have lost, like the whole opening process probably took like five, six hours as a whole, just if I include like the going to the bank, you know, the commute, the time I'm wasting. And I'm just thinking that just a whole lot of solopreneurs or small business owners, they just don't have time to do that. If you add the fact that I have a young daughter, so if they have kids, family, they're trying to

leave a little bit of time. And I think that's another thing the survey found is just a lot of them are making minimum wage or less, just in the sheer amount of hours that they're working. And the other thing for us that we found that was nice with the UK Bank is actually we got some interest on our cash, like not negligible too, because we're probably the exception where we have a solid emergency fund for a business, and that was obviously one of the other findings. But on top of that, was there any other things that you found in the survey in terms of feeling underserved by traditional banking? Maybe some resonated by what they just said, but maybe other things. I mean, your story of six hours seems not too bad compared to my personal

experience over a decade ago, or it took me about two months in duration to get my accounts set up in countless branch trips, just to get the basic deposit. payments. And then you want to add a credit card on top of that? We're talking about like another few months and maybe some personal guarantees and other things for your business account. So very, very painful. And I think those are some of the things we've heard from our customers. And through this survey, like 54% of their respondents cited their frustration with high or unexpected fees. So they just weren't anticipating them. And then for the balances they were holding, they were getting low to no interest rates. So just a general lack

a value around the business accounts, the products. It's a great business model for the banks, though. It's a great business model for the big banks, that's for sure. And this is where there's an opportunity to do things better because we feel as a schedule on bank, Canada's seventh largest bank, we can still provide more value to customers. So I think they, we really hope that the consumers can start to wake up and see that there's a better opportunity here. And what additional value, like things did you bring?

to the banking platform for EQBank compared to what was offered out there? Yeah, so I mentioned the high fees. Like a lot of monthly costs could be $20, even higher sometimes. Like I've heard 60 even from some of the customers that have moved over. And that also requires some kind of minimum balance, usually, to be able to reduce the fees. And so this is an area where we have no monthly fee. And so that already is just a huge aim point where entrepreneurs will keep more in their business

and then in their own pockets rather than have to just erode kind of the value that they're seen from an incumbent. Next one would be like there's usually some kind of tiered interest rate models like you really only going to get paid for your balances you're holding and save more if you're holding some number. Maybe it's 10,000, maybe it's 100,000, which is a significant amount of capital to be holding.

And so we're paying interest rates on every dollar that are held in those accounts and quite competitive interest rates. The other piece is there's a very limited or apt transaction amounts. So often the fees for intract transfers or tech deposits or are moving money can really add up. And nickel and dime entrepreneurs quite a bit. And so that's an area where we've provided a really healthy amount of free transactions. We think are relevant for kind of the solopreneur in a more modern digital economy. because a lot of their payments are digital payments. And this digital onboarding,

and we mentioned the trips to the branch to get things set up. Like, this is time not well spent for business owners. And so simplifying that to an online process where they don't require an in-person branch visit is also a huge differentiator in this space. Yeah, I think if I remember, it took me maybe 30 minutes to set it up. Like, it's been about a year. I think, again, if memory serves me well.

So 30 minutes was a big difference. I was definitely happy I didn't have to do any in-person visits because it's just, yeah, it's very painful. Super painful. So we're happy to solve those pain points and give entrepreneurs back more time. Having cash on hand is essential for any business. Traditional business accounts hit you with high fees

while paying little to no interest on the cash you need for day-to-day operations. That was our experience too until we switched to the new EQ Bank business account. Now, every dollar earns high interest with no monthly fees and no minimum balance. You also get free everyday transactions like EFTs, bill payments, mobile check deposits, and 50 outgoing and 100 incoming free interackey transfers. And to sign up, quick and fully online, no branch visits because, let's be honest,

no business owner has time for that. We use it for our own business and it's the first account that actually helps our money work harder while keeping operations simple. Check it out today at eqbank.ca slash business. Want to buy a stock but don't want to shell out hundreds or even thousands for a single share? With Questrade's new fractional shares, you can invest any dollar amount and build a diversified portfolio instantly. No delays, no trade fees, no excuses. Want to put $10 into a stock trading at $100? No problem. Questrade has you covered.

They're the first broker in Canada to offer real-time commission-free trading for U.S. fractional shares in ETFs. It's simple, powerful, and finally available in Canada. Head to questrade.com to open and fund an account. Use code TCI and you get $50 to get you started. Winters in Canada can be pretty cold, but they can also be pretty magic. We're thinking about taking a short trip from Ottawa to Quebec City for the winter carnival. My wife and I spent our honeymoon there a few years ago, so it will always have a special meaning for us.

And now, with my daughter, she'll also get a chance to appreciate how great Quebec City is. She'll be able to practice speaking French, and I can already picture her lighting up when she sees the ice sculptures or tries snow tubing for the first time. After a full day of activities, I can imagine us heading back to our whole whole. home away from home on Airbnb, making a warm dinner, maybe picking up some local pastries for dessert, and just winding down playing some board games with a nice glass of red wine. It got me thinking about hosting our own place. While we'd be away, our home could give another family the chance to enjoy winter loot in Ottawa as it will just be sitting empty while we are away. The nice part is we get to decide when our place is available and it lets us make a little

extra to put towards our next trip instead of having our place just sit empty. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca slash host. To get back to the survey, so it's shown that 51%

of solopreneurs feel today's global trade environment impacts their business as much or more than the pandemic. And obviously we've seen that in the news. I don't think there's any newsday where Donald Trump or the trade war doesn't make the news, some kind of comment in Canada or some kind of new tariffs on Canada. So it also

sheds light on the daily financial challenges that solo printers and microbusinesses owners are dealing with. And I actually as a side note, and I want to hear what stood out to you, but even before Trump took office, I used to work my old job. I'm focused on the podcast full time, but I used to be at Export Development Canada in HR, but I knew enough about the baseness and talked to enough people within the business that you can tell that a lot of solopreneurs go to them for exports because there's a lot of challenges and having kept touch with a few of them, I know that those challenges, and of course it's not just solopreneurs or micro-businesses, but across the spectrum, it's definitely

increased ever since Donald Trump took office. So I don't know if you can comment on that And also what stood out to you the most from that 51% of solepreneurs feeling it's worse or the same as a pandemic? I think it comes down to it's more complicated environment than it was maybe a decade ago. And entrepreneurs need to spend a lot more time focusing on how they're going to navigate all the complexities that have now been introduced or are changing daily. And so it requires a lot of attention time that they need to spend there. The other piece I'd say that's a complementary data point in the survey was that 40% were really dissatisfied with the level of financial or advisory support they received. And so they're finding they have to not only go spend all this time to figure out like what's changing and how it's going to impact their business. They're not getting the corresponding financial advice to help them understand like how best to navigate the scenario as a business owner.

And so I think those two pieces together are really a much more impactful than they were. a decade ago due to a ton of different factors, including the political climate. No, that's really interesting. I mean, I was definitely surprised by a few things, of course, just a personal story. My dad owned his business for a big part of his life. And I can definitely relate to making very low hourly wage. I think a lot of people don't understand that a lot of these solopreneurs work sometimes 60, 70, 80 hours a week. And sure, they may end up doing decent income at the end of the year.

But then if you factor in all the hours they put in, it's not a high hour rate. And a lot of businesses, unfortunately, it's not, it's lumpy income too. So there's a lot of uncertainty involved with that. And there's a stat we saw in the survey that like 40% of respondents spend maybe 10 hours or less on their core business. And the rest is around everything surrounding like how they just manage it. and I have the administration of it and other things. And so, like, yeah, when you dilute your hourly wage down to those core 10 hours, like, it's super impactful, super demoralizing.

It's such a big challenge for entrepreneurs. Yeah. And for people that, you know, don't own a business and or live in Ottawa where I'm at, where there's a lot of federal workers, I mean, they may say, well, just hire employees or hire someone to do that. But unfortunately, sometimes you just don't have the castrow to be able to support that. So you have to do it yourself. So I think I just want to.

wanted to mention that just from personal experience. But in terms of there's many listeners that are entrepreneurs, I think in the last five, six years we saw that number, especially solopreneurs actually increase in Canada. What would you like to say to all of them and small business owners listening to us? And then we'll finish, we'll wrap up with a little bit different question that I know you're looking forward to as well. I'd say there's two things I'd want to highlight. One is, like, despite all these challenges we've talked about, almost all of the respondents, the bulk majority of them, said they would still choose to start a business despite these headwinds. So there's still enough rewarding things behind their decisions and

the past they've chosen and the excitement they have, that they would still choose to do this again. What I would say to kind of the listener base is, like, that resonates with me as an entrepreneur and an entrepreneur now in my career, but also there's a better banking solution out there to support you. So some of the headaches that may have been challenges with the past ventures or companies you've created, like we've got a really compelling product

and business offering that is going to reduce some of your anxiety and headaches and keep more money in your pocket as we go so that you can afford that first full-time hire as we talked about as you get to that point in scaling up your business and then get more time spent on your core business and growth. So we think we've really got something unique here. And I encourage everyone to go check it out. Yeah. Yeah. No, I definitely agree. I think that's a great

message. Like I said, I've been using the platform. We've been, well, I say we, but I take care of that aspect of the business. So I've been using it on a personal basis for four or five years now. And then with the business account since about last year when we got invited to try the better. And really happy to have it again for us was the fees. we were paying with the big bank and also the fact that we're actually getting interest on our cash. And, you know, it's a decent emergency fund as well that we have for the business. So that's a big, big part for us. So I guess we'll finish here. So a question that I know you're probably pretty familiar with, but it always always fascinates me the banking sector. So Canada's banking

sector is dominated by six large incumbents. I don't think this is news to yourself or anyone else listening and historically that's meant slower change simply because the system is concentrated and there isn't as much incentive to innovate quickly. As a newer entrant, EQBank has really pushed the envelope on the innovation front. We just saw it with, you know, making these kind of applications, for example, all doable online. And I'm curious what it's been like to drive regulatory change within that environment. Because just from the outside my perspective and some conversation I've had from, you know, people with Hube Bank, but also other people.

It seems like maintaining the status quo is often the default, and you really have to kind of push hard, and sometimes it takes a while for that change to come through. So, I'm on this is super timely because I was actually just in Ottawa the past couple days. Oh, and like it's super exciting to see some of the differences, I'd say, in where an optimism and excitement and energy that is buzzing around

kind of the problem statement you just mentioned. And so the budget area specifically for financial services have a lot of pro-competition areas. And it seems like there's this bigger vision that's forming around payments and open banking and digital identity and how we think about defense against financial crime. And so it's super optimistic that, yes, we've been talking about these pieces individually for the last decade.

They may not have been moving as fast as we would have all liked. But through the continuous voices of us and others in Ottawa, we're actually seeing a bigger vision that's starting to come together with all that feedback. And so I'm super optimistic that there's going to be more change at a faster pace as we start to move from kind of the budget proposal to approval to approval. and to execution now around some of these different areas. I'd say that's kind of the first piece, I'd say, like there's a lot of excitement building right now. No, that's great to hear. I notice a few things definitely that were interesting in the budget,

so it would be interesting to see whether that goes forward or not. Usually, if it's in there, at least it's on the radar at the very least. I think they don't put it in there for no reason. Well, before we wrapped this up, was there anything else that you wanted to touch on? because we did cover quite a bit, and it is definitely, I think, something really important. It's solopreneurs, that survey and those rare, I call it micro-businesses. I don't know if there is a correct term for them, but I feel like it's also something that just we don't hear a lot in the news. You know, sometimes local news, you'll hear a story here or there, like a restaurant that's closing because everyone loved it in a community or something like that.

But you tend to hear about GM, you know, moving jobs to the U.S. because it affects a whole lot of people, rightfully so. But I think it's definitely, it's definitely, it needs more light to be shed on that, that important part of the Canadian economy, in my opinion. Oh, absolutely. I think we have always tried to introduce products that solve real problems for customers and not take this 50-year-old approach to how it's always been. And so, especially with this offering for our small business segment,

And we felt they were completely underserved. No one really understood them to what we saw on the survey and kind of what's available elsewhere in market for them. And so we really listened to a lot of those pain points and put those into this product design. And so there's one anecdote from a digital designer who said, well, why is my bank offering me all these like card-based payment mechanisms? I don't need that.

Like, I'm a digital designer. Everyone's going to pay me through Intrach or through other mechanisms digitally. And so we really try to zoom in to understand those different segments and make sure that we could meet their needs, actually give them a solution for today's world, not for 50 years ago. And so I think Canada just overall the banking environment, it's looking exciting and dynamic again. And I think that we're really optimists like that EQ can keep solving those problems and applying a more modern, innovative kind of solution to the customers. because the only way we're really going to see this momentum towards all these better products is that people can really understand them

and have a simple view that their pain points are being solved. And a lot of the things that the government's been talking about for pro-competition, like we've got to have real use cases behind those that are going to impact Canadians' day-to-day lives. Infrastructure is needed, but it's the use cases and kind of the adoption that's really going to make things change at rapid pace.

Okay, well, I think that's the great way to end. to end in there. Dan, thanks again for joining the podcast. Hopefully we can do that again because I have a few other questions that I know I will probably have on the banking space and you're clearly very knowledgeable on all of that. So probably we'll have to book you maybe in the new year. I know your calendar is probably pretty busy. But thanks again for coming on the podcast. No, happy to geek out on the topic and looking forward to our next chat month. Thank you. Thank you for having me. The Canadian investor podcast should not be construed as investment or financial advice.

The host and guests featured may own securities or assets discussed on this podcast. Always do your own due diligence or consult with a financial professional before making any financial or investment decisions.