Here are the stocks I’m watching lately, supported by votes of confidence from the guest analysts brought in lately on BNN:

Arc Energy Trust - (AET.UN-T): $28-29
Crescent Point Energy - (CPU.UN-T): $33-34
Husky Energy - (HSE-T): $43-44
Freehold Royalty Trust - (FRU.UN-T): $21-22
Diana Shipping - (DSX-N): $28-29

Interesting that most of them are oil plays. Oil per barrel is really cheap right now, and that means all the oil stocks are on sale. I really want to take the opportunity to buy some up, but with limited cash, I can either do this or put some more money in US stocks for increasing my US cashflow (since most US stocks are superbly on sale right now, too). Not sure which decision to take.

The Loonie could be falling again if oil stays low. In that case I’d better buy my US stocks now while I don’t lose money in the exchange rate. On the other hand, because oil is low right now, all the great Canadian energy plays are on sale too.

Hmmm…. what would you do? If you’re Canadian, or living/working in Canada, how are you planning to take advantage or protect the recent highs of the Loonie?

Canadian or American, the dollars are pretty much as equal as they can be today. It’s a good day to go in to your local currency exchange and pick up on the holiday dollars you need for vacationing, conferences, business, or whenever else you need to do anything across the border.

For Americans, who knows how much higher the loonie will go? In all fairness, at least based on historical performance, it doesn’t seem likely it will go higher than $1.10, but that number’s been bandied around lately by our Finance Minister as looking likely.

For Canadians, it’s an even bigger draw. This is the time to load up on your greenbacks while you don’t lose any money.

I’m not a forex trader, in fact, I know little about professional forex trading at this point - although I’m going to learn it - but for just very practical purposes, this is a good time to continue your cross-border purchases. Prices is either country can be compared most easily, now, too.

Do you have Canadian or American investments? Might want to make extra deposits or purchases now. In any case, it’s a good time to review how they’re doing. It is not often that we see dollar parity as we did earlier today. One good service for comparing currencies is Oanda. You can see that the dollars have already shifted a bit, but keep paying attention. (And what is a thousandth of a dollar, anyways? I wouldn’t personally worry about the fourth decimal place).

Also see the Financial Post story, “Canadian Dollar Hits Parity While Greenback Falls to Record Low.”