Every retiree gets exactly one shot at one sequence of returns — and the first five years can quietly cost you more than half your lifetime portfolio.

00:00 — Introduction: the sequence tax and why order matters more than average return

If you think launching an ETF sounds like a great business, Eric Balchunas is here to explain why it might be the most brutal competitive arena in finance — and which products are actually winning in 2026.

Pierre Daillie sits down with Eric Balchunas — Senior ETF Analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, co-host of the Trillions podcast, and author of The Bogle Effect — for an unflinching tour of the ETF Terrordome. Eric maps the structural forces that make ETF success so elusive: Vanguard and BlackRock together capturing 60% of all flows, over 2,000 funds trapped below the $50M zombie line, and a liquidation rate that could hit one-in-three. He unpacks his three C's of ETF survival (Cheap, Creative, or Cabernet), breaks down why legacy active managers finally found their footing by lowering fees, and explains the DRAM phenomenon — a memory chip ETF that reached $15 billion in 60 days by solving a real access problem. The conversation moves into Eric's 26 for '26 ETFs to Watch list, covering uranium mining, auto callable ETFs, laddered buffer strategies, and the growing derivative income space. Balchunas also shares his thesis on why the "Vanguard bid" and government backstops have fundamentally changed how markets absorb sell-offs — and why Bogle may be the most underrated behavioral economist in investing history.

00:00 — Introduction: Welcome to the Terrordome

#ETF #ETFs2026 #EricBalchunas #BloombergIntelligence #ETFInvesting #PassiveInvesting #ActiveETF #Vanguard #BlackRock #IndexFunds #ETFIndustry #Terrordome #TheBogleEffect #CoveredCallETF #BufferETF #AutoCallable #ManagedFutures #PortableAlpha #UraniumETF #DRAM #Trillions #InsightIsCapital #WealthManagement #AdvisorInvesting #InvestmentStrategy #FinancePodcast

Most portfolios already own the AI trade — but almost none own the energy underneath it, and that's exactly where the next big opportunity lives.

In this episode of Raise Your Average, hosts Pierre Daillie and Mike Philbrick sit down with Justin Huhn, Founder, Lead Analyst and Editor of Uranium Insider, to unpack why uranium is the missing layer beneath the AI trade — and why the structural supply-demand imbalance in the nuclear fuel cycle may be one of the most consequential and overlooked investment opportunities of the decade.

Justin traces uranium's journey from a forgotten commodity trading near $18/lb in 2017 to today's spot price of $85 — and explains why the bull case is more durable now than ever. The convergence of AI data center power demand, Western electricity grid strain, reactor life extensions, hyperscaler nuclear power agreements, and a deeply undersupplied fuel cycle has created a structural setup that, in Justin's view, doesn't require the AI tailwind to deliver significantly higher uranium prices. That tailwind is, as he puts it, "a bonus."

The conversation covers the full uranium fuel cycle — from mine to reactor — including why supply simply cannot respond as quickly as demand, why utilities are systematically late to contract, how hyperscalers like Microsoft, Google and Amazon entering the nuclear fuel market is a landmark signal, and how advisors can think about positioning uranium as an infrastructure-adjacent hedge on the AI power squeeze.

00:00 — Introduction: AI, energy crisis, and the nuclear renaissance

#Uranium #NuclearEnergy #AIInfrastructure #EnergyInvesting #UraniumInsider #NuclearRenaissance #DataCenterPower #SmallModularReactors #UraniumBullMarket #RaiseYourAverage #CriticalMinerals #EnergyTransition #NuclearStocks #UraniumMining #PowerGrid #AIDataCenters #AlternativeEnergy #PortfolioConstruction #InvestmentStrategy #FinancePodcast

The desk at RBC Capital Markets that sits behind 90% of Canada's ETF market has a view of where flows are really going — and it's not what most advisors expect.

Pierre Daillie sits down with Valerie Grimba, Head of Global ETF Strategy at RBC Capital Markets, for a wide-ranging conversation about the forces quietly reshaping how Canadian advisors build portfolios. Valerie's team serves as designated broker to roughly 300 ETF mandates and acts as authorized participant across the majority of the Canadian ETF market — giving her a real-time, flow-level view of investor behaviour that almost nobody else has. From the structural fracture that 2022 opened in the 60/40 model, to the liquidity misconceptions her desk corrects every single day, to the explosive rise of asset allocation ETFs, covered call strategies, AAA CLOs, and precision thematic plays, this conversation covers the full terrain of where the ETF market stands today — and where it is heading.

CHAPTERS

00:00 — Introduction: The 60/40 failure and Canada's ETF rebuild

In this episode of Insight Is Capital, Pierre Daillie sit down with Ben Felix — Chief Investment Officer and Portfolio Manager at PWL Capital, co-host of the Rational Reminder podcast, and the driving force behind one of the most-watched evidence-based investing channels on YouTube with over half a million subscribers.

Ben unpacks the philosophy and hard-won lessons behind PWL's radical transparency strategy — giving away the "secret sauce" of their entire investment process — and why that counterintuitive bet became the engine of the firm's organic growth. He shares how a Costco parking lot moment sparked his channel concept, why it took him three years to crack a smile on camera, and what the advice industry still consistently gets wrong about content marketing.

The conversation turns candid when Ben addresses the alternatives wave sweeping Canadian portfolios — and PWL's longstanding decision to focus on building systematic, rules-based portfolios. He then reframes the advisor value proposition entirely: a real client's story reveals that none of the reasons they hired PWL had anything to do with securities selection or beating the market, and more importantly, a laundry list of high-value living, breathing concerns.

The episode closes with Ben's most powerful framework for life and practice — the PERMA-V model of human flourishing — and a striking parallel between the five factor model for investing and the five factors of a well-lived life.

⏱️ CHAPTERS

00:00 – Introduction: Who is Ben Felix and why your clients are already watching him

#BenFelix #PWLCapital #EvidenceBasedInvesting #IndexInvesting #RationalReminder #FinancialPlanning #AdvisorAlpha #DIYInvesting #FactorInvesting #WealthManagement #InsightIsCapital #PersonalFinanceCanada #ETFInvesting #FinancialAdvisor #FiduciaryAdvisor #InvestingCanada #MoneyScope #PassiveInvesting #BehaviouralFinance #PERMAModel

Canada's ETF market isn't just growing — it's being structurally rewired, and Ron Landry has a front-row seat to where every dollar is flowing and why.

Pierre Daillie sits down with Ronald Landry, Vice President and Head of Segment Solutions and Canadian ETF Services at CIBC Mellon, for a wide-ranging look at the forces driving Canada's historic ETF surge. With nearly $95 billion in net flows through May 2026 — 57% ahead of last year's run rate — Ron unpacks why this isn't a cyclical wave but a structural shift in how Canadians save, invest, and expect to be served. From the rise of income-generating ETFs and single-stock strategies to tokenization, TCR disclosure, and the regulatory cost burden quietly falling on investors, this conversation delivers the institutional vantage point advisors rarely access. Ron and Pierre also tackle what it really takes for a new ETF to survive, why advisor-guided portfolios outperform DIY by 3.6x, and what the next phase of Canadian ETF product formation looks like as active management quietly takes over the flow story.

[00:00:00] — Introduction: Pierre sets the stage on Canada's surging ETF flows and welcomes Ron Landry of CIBC Mellon

#CanadianETF #ETFInvesting #InsightIsCapital #WealthManagement #FinancialAdvisor #ETFCanada #CoveredCallETF #ActiveETF #InvestmentFunds #CIBCMellon #CanadianInvesting #ETFFlows #TotalCostReporting #PortfolioManagement #FinancialPlanning #DIYInvesting #Incomeinvesting #ETFIndustry #CanadianFinance #AdvisorAlyst

Larry Swedroe has spent 30 years proving the market will almost always beat you — and in this episode, he explains why that's about to become even more true.

In this episode of Raise Your Average, hosts Pierre Daillie and Mike Philbrick sit down with legendary evidence-based investing author and outsourced CIO Larry Swedroe for a wide-ranging masterclass on where markets are heading and what investors must do to survive them. Swedroe breaks down how AI is accelerating market efficiency rather than unlocking alpha, why the 60/40 portfolio carries far more equity risk than most investors realize, and why true hyper-diversification — across private credit, reinsurance, return stacking, and long-short factor strategies — is the only credible response to a world where correlation assumptions break at exactly the wrong moment. He confronts the behavioral mistakes social media is making worse, challenges advisors to stress-test risk tolerance with real dollar numbers, and argues the future of wealth management belongs to those who master alternatives.

00:00 — Cold Open: AI and the Adaptive Markets Hypothesis

#EvidenceBasedInvesting #FactorInvesting #MarketEfficiency #AIInvesting #ReturnStacking #BehavioralFinance #WealthManagement #AlternativeInvestments #PortfolioConstruction #FinancialAdvisor #RaiseYourAverage #LarrySwedroe #RetirementPlanning #ManagedFutures #TrendFollowing #PrivateCredit #Reinsurance #HyperDiversification #InvestmentStrategy #FinancePodcast #IndexInvesting #FactorPremium #ActiveVsPassive #AdvisorAnalyst #MikePhilbrick #PierreDaillie #LongShortStrategy #MonteCarloSimulation #SequenceOfReturnsRisk #PortfolioRisk

He replaced his paycheck with a covered call ETF portfolio, moved to Panama, and put the whole system on display — because transparency, it turns out, is the most powerful financial planning tool nobody in the industry is using.

What does it actually look like to live off your portfolio — not someday, but now? Pierre Daillie sits down with Adriano Starinieri, creator of the Passive Income Investing YouTube channel and the voice behind one of Canada's fastest-growing DIY finance communities, to answer that question in full. Adriano walks through his complete origin story: working-class Montreal roots, a father who speculated on penny stocks, a 20-year mortgage paid off in 7 years, and a decision in 2019 to sell the condo, invest the proceeds, and go all-in on covered call ETFs — just months before the COVID crash. Today he and his wife live in Panama, financially independent, drawing monthly income from a seven-figure portfolio he reviews publicly on YouTube every single month.

For investors, this episode is a masterclass in income-first portfolio construction. Adriano breaks down exactly how covered call ETFs work, why the 2021 arrival of lightly leveraged versions effectively solved the total return problem, how to evaluate any covered call ETF by asset quality, coverage ratio, and leverage, and why the buy-and-hold-forever mindset eliminates the behavioural mistakes that derail most portfolios. He makes a compelling case that for income-seeking investors, covered call ETFs don't just compete with bonds — they may make the traditional fixed income sleeve obsolete.

For advisors, this episode is a window into how the next generation of clients is already thinking — and who they're already listening to. Adriano's 250,000-subscriber community was built on a single, confronting idea: radical transparency. He shows his real portfolio, his real numbers, his real monthly distributions — and his audience trusts him completely because of it. Pierre and Adriano explore what that trust gap reveals about how advisors communicate, why proprietary product recommendations erode client confidence, and what it would look like for an advisory practice to meet younger investors where they actually are: online, sceptical, and hungry for education over salesmanship.

00:00 — Introduction: Who Is Adriano Starinieri?

#PassiveIncomeInvesting #CoveredCallETF #CanadianETFs #PassiveIncome #IncomeInvesting #DividendInvesting #FinancialIndependence #FIRECanada #DIYInvesting #ETFIncome #HamiltonETFs #GlobalXCanada #HarvestETFs #EvolveETFs #QQCL #USCL #InsightIsCapital #AdvisorAnalyst #RetirementIncome #InvestingForBeginners #CoveredCalls #OptionsIncome #BuyAndHold #PortfolioIncome #MonthlyIncome #WealthBuilding #InvestingCanada #TFSA #PersonalFinanceCanada #FinancialFreedom

Most investors think they understand what they own — Devin Anderson and Zed Francis of Convexitas are here to prove they don't, and to show what the next generation of derivative investing actually looks like.

Pierre Daillie and Mike Philbrick welcome Devin Anderson and Zed Francis, Co-Founders of Convexitas, for a masterclass in derivative investing that challenges everything advisors and investors think they know about covered calls, buffered ETFs, and options-based income strategies. Drawing on deep institutional backgrounds — Devin from two decades at Deutsche Bank's equity derivatives structuring desk, and Zed from UBS credit trading, distressed hedge funds, and Legal & General — the two founders lay bare the hidden complexity lurking inside "simple" yield products that dominate today's wealth management landscape.

The conversation pulls no punches: the hockey-stick diagrams used to explain covered call ETFs at point-of-sale actively mask real-time risk exposures that can shift dramatically intraday. A product sold as "half the risk of equities" can quietly become nearly full equity exposure within hours of a 1% market move — and most advisors and clients have no idea. Devin and Zed argue this isn't a reason to abandon these products, but a powerful case for active, continuous derivative management that delivers what the product actually promised.

The founders introduce Convexitas's philosophy: that the options market is structurally mispriced, and that most yield-seeking investors are sitting on the wrong side of that mispricing. They walk through the SMA-based approach — designed to generate accessible liquidity precisely when markets crash, enabling advisors to rebalance into distressed assets rather than being frozen by tax friction, behavioral paralysis, or trapped capital in fund wrappers. From the mechanics of short volatility to the case for unfunded overlays, return stacking, and Warren Buffett's alpha decoded through Fama-French factors, this episode is essential listening for any advisor navigating the derivative income revolution.

00:00 — Introduction: The income wave reshaping wealth management

04:52 — Meet Devin Anderson & Zed Francis: Career arcs and the founding of Convexitas

12:16 — What investors actually own: The hidden complexity inside covered call ETFs

16:18 — Real-time risk exposure: How moneyness shifts dramatically intraday

19:17 — The silent danger: Stacking short volatility across multiple products

28:00 — Structural mispricing in the options market: Why sellers face a systemic disadvantage

38:00 — Investment products vs. trading instruments: A critical distinction for advisors

43:08 — The income stack: Gaining Gold and Bitcoin exposure with capital efficiency

50:43 — First-gen vs. next-gen: From buffered ETFs to actively managed derivative overlays

57:08 — Tax efficiency, rebalancing, and the SMA advantage

01:18:06 — Why accessible capital is the biggest benefit of risk mitigation — not mark-to-market

01:23:53 — Buying when there's blood in the streets: Liquidity, structure, and Warren Buffett's alpha

01:26:37 — Final outlook: Inflation, financialization, and the binary tail risks ahead

#CoveredCallETF #BufferedETF #DerivativeInvesting #OptionsTrading #WealthManagement #VolatilityHarvesting #ReturnStacking #TailRiskHedge #FinancialAdvisors #IncomeInvesting #PortfolioConstruction #AlternativeInvestments #RiskManagement #TaxEfficientInvesting #SMAInvesting #RaiseYourAverage #Convexitas #InvestmentStrategy #OptionsEducation #AdvisorAlpha

Joe Canavan built three companies that redefined how Canadians invest — then walked away, backed Wealthsimple before anyone knew the name, and now he's asking one question: why does Canada keep burning down what it builds?

In this episode of Insight Is Capital, host Pierre Daillie sits down with Joe Canavan, Principal at Canavan Capital and one of Bay Street's most consequential institution builders, for a wide-ranging conversation on wealth creation, entrepreneurship, and Canada's innovation deficit. Canavan traces his career from retail advisor to founding Fidelity Canada's growth era, GT Global, and Synergy Asset Management — and through to early-stage investing in Wealthsimple, Layer 6, Koho Financial, CapIntel, and Radical AI.

He unpacks why Canada's startup ecosystem was on the verge of becoming Silicon North before self-inflicted policy decisions reversed the momentum, and makes the case for a generational vision — "Innovation Nation 2047" — to build millions more millionaires, retain top talent, and attract global capital. The conversation also covers artificial general intelligence, quantum computing, robotics, financial infrastructure security, the leadership crisis in Canadian cities, and why incentives — as Charlie Munger said — determine every outcome.

CHAPTERS

00:00 – Introduction: What does it actually take to build wealth?

#CanadianEntrepreneurship #InsightIsCapital #JoeCanavan #Wealthsimple #FinancialInfrastructure #AIInvesting #QuantumComputing #SiliconNorth #VentureCapital #BayStreet #StartupEcosystem #CanadianFintech #WealthCreation #InnovationNation #LeadershipMatters #CanadianInvestors #AGI #CapitalMarkets #Fintech #AdvisorAnalyst