Do you have a Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP) and you don’t quite know how it works?

Are you sure that you’re using it to the fullest potential?

Here’s some key information and a comparison between a variety of funding strategies, so you can make a more informed decision on what will work best for you.

Student who will receive the benefit of savings in the account.

Multiple students if the account has been set up as a Family RESP (

Family RESPs provide extra flexibility when withdrawing!

A contribution to the RESP that attracts the Canada Education Savings Grant (CESG)

A contribution to the RESP that is over the annual contribution limit, and so does not attract CESG

The Canada Education Savings Grant, which provides a 20% matching bonus to assisted contributions (every $5 you put in; government adds $1) for children through age 17.

The value of the tax-sheltered investment returns inside the RESP

A withdrawal type made while a student is enrolled in post-secondary education.

This type of withdrawal is made up of Grant, and Growth & Income, and is taxable to the Student.

 A withdrawal type made while a student is enrolled in post-secondary education.

This type of withdrawal is made up of Contributions, and is non-taxable.

A non-taxable withdrawal of contributions paid to the subscriber.

Making this type of withdrawal prior to the Grant portion being withdrawn by an eligible student will cause a clawback of the Grant.

$2,500 new annual room, or $5,000 maximum assisted annual contribution room using carry-forward.

Assisted Contribution Room Carry-forward:

 Any assisted contribution room that has not been used.

This amount is cumulative and rolls forward.

 $50,000 maximum, so up to $36,000 could be grant-assisted contributions, leaving $14,000 in 

This model is built around the idea of maximizing the assisted contributions annually from birth to age 17 to ensure all contributions attract the Grant amount.

If you start right away, funding the RESP with $2,000 per year will maximize the grant dollars earned over the 18 years.

Yes, your child begins earning Assisted Contribution room at birth, so a full 18 contribution years are available.

If you are able to start saving in the same year your child is born, and you are able to save less than $2,000 per year ($167/mo or $77 bi-weekly), the best practice would be to set up a regular savings schedule of a small amount, repeating often.

Saving $25 or $50 bi-weekly will feel less impactful than a larger monthly or quarterly amount.

Aim a bit lower than you think and practice the habit of saving first.

Once you’re confident that you won’t have to reduce or skip any contributions, increase the contribution amount.

If you are able to start saving in the same year your child is born, and you are able to save up to $2,500 per year (or consider maximizing assisted contributions as your gift to your student) limit your contributions to $2,500 per year.

In just over 14 years, you will have contributed $36,000 and received the full $7,200 in grant dollars.

The most common strategy is the same as above, with regular contributions throughout the year.

However, if you have the financial flexibility to do so, consider making a lump-sum contribution in January each year to maximize the time the funds are invested inside the tax-sheltered account. 

This model is built around the idea that life happens, and not every year is going to go perfectly to maximize your contributions, or even to begin them ‘on time’!

This model is likely the most common one used by Canadians, in some form or another.

Children begin accumulating Assisted Contribution Room at birth, but many families either do not or cannot start saving for their education immediately.

Luckily, the RESP rules allow you to ‘catch up’ on assisted contributions, with a maximum of $5,000 of Assisted Contributions in any year 

 you have enough Assisted Contribution Carry-forward Room.

A couple has their first child, but due to job changes and moves are not able to start saving until their child is 9 years old.

At this point, their child has accumulated $25,000 in Assisted Contribution Room ($2,500 per year from birth through age 9).

The parents can now contribute up to $5,000 per year for the next 5 years to catch up on the original accumulated room.

The child is now 14 and has continued to accrue the final $11,000 of Assisted Contribution Room over the past 5 years, so the parents can save $5,000 per year at age 15 and 16, and a final $1,000 at age 17 to have fully caught up to maximize Assisted Contributions and Grant.

A couple starts RESP savings for their child at birth, but is only able to save a few hundred dollars per year, increasing the amount after a few years, and then again after a few more.

When their child is 10, they come into a windfall and realize they’ll be able to fully fund the RESP, but want to make sure they do it properly to maximize Assisted Contributions to attract the most amount of Grant.

The following table demonstrates the differences between the four scenarios above.  All of the scenarios maximize the Grant received.  Assuming contributions are made at the beginning of the year, and a 6% annual rate of return, these plans have the following estimated outcomes:

Worth noting is the difference in final market values between the catch-up models, where starting earlier with 

 significantly outperforms waiting to do more later!  For the prudent investor, total time invested is as important as any other factor.

RESP Bonus Strategies: Maximizing, Front-End Loading, and Super-Funding

These final strategies push the RESP to it’s limits, literally, by maximizing the total contributions to $50,000, beyond the Assisted Contribution level of $36,000.

These describe the standard application, but can also be combined with catch-up models.

Contributions maximize both the total grant received and total possible contribution room, and are spread out evenly over the full 18 years to minimize / standardize the annual savings commitment.

Contributions maximize both the total grant received and total possible contribution room.  A Non-assisted Contribution of $14,000 is invested in the first year to maximize the amount of time it is invested inside the tax-sheltered account.

For those with the means to super-fund an RESP, the full $50,000 possible is put into the account and invested immediately.  Contributions maximize both the total possible contribution room and the time invested inside the tax-sheltered account.  This strategy does 

The following table demonstrates the differences between the three scenarios above.  All of the scenarios maximize the Grant received, except for the Super-Funding strategy in the final column which only receives Grant money in the first year.  Assuming contributions are made at the beginning of the year, and a 6% annual rate of return, these plans have the following estimated outcomes:

Whether slow or fast, starting now or later, super-funded or funded to the best of your ability, the RESP is a powerful, tax-sheltered savings account that requires an understanding of both how to fund it properly, and how to keep it safely invested.

If you have any questions about these Savings Strategies or if you’re approaching the time to start making withdrawals to fund your student’s education, please call or email and we can discuss the strategy that will be the most impactful for you.

Do you have a Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP) and you don’t quite know how it works?  Are you sure that you’re using it to the fullest potential?  Here’s some key information and a comparison between a variety of funding strategies, so you can make a more informed decision on what will work best for you.

Guide to RESP Savings Strategies

It’s an easy thing to get confused with all of the initialisms floating around for investment account types in Canada.  This document will run through the most common investment account types and provide a short description of their key features.

All of these account types can be thought of as the different “buckets” that your investments are held in.  For example, you do not “invest in a TFSA”, you contribute to a TFSA and then make the investment inside of that account type.

The three most common accounts an investor will encounter are the RRSP / RRIF account, the TFSA, and the NREG account.

 – Registered Retirement Savings Program – this is a tax-deferred account, where any capital gains/losses or income earned inside the account is not taxable.  Contribution room is accumulated at a rate of 18% of earned income, and contributions are deductible against taxable income.  As the investor gains a tax deduction with contributions made to the account, the reverse is true on withdrawals – all withdrawals are taxable as regular income.  Most importantly, any withdrawals are 

 replaceable in the future; the original contribution room is permanently lost.

 – Registered Retirement Income Fund – this is the “second stage” of the RRSP, which is created when the RRSP is required to convert to a RRIF in the year an investor turns age 71 (you can also convert early).  Like the RRSP, this is a tax-deferred account, where any capital gains/losses or income earned inside the account is not taxable.  The investor is required to take an annual minimum payment from the account.  Withdrawals are taxable as regular income.

 – Tax-Free Savings Account – this is the only truly tax-free account.  Contributions are not deductible against taxable income, but all gains/losses and income earned inside the account are tax-free, 

and most importantly, withdrawals are tax-free

.  New contribution room becomes available each year for all Canadians 18 and older, currently at a pace of $7,000 per year.  As a valuable additional feature (and unlike the RRSP), withdrawals taken from the TFSA are re-added to contribution room in the following calendar year.

 – not a “standard” initialism, but this is the shorthand for a non-registered / taxable account.  Capital gains / losses and income are all reflected as income (or income offsets) in annual tax returns.

Other account types that you may hear about include:

 – Locked-In Retirement Account / Locked-In Registered Savings Plan / Locked-In Income Fund – a tax-deferred account that results from commuting an earned pension.  This is nearly identical to the RRSP / RRIF, except you cannot make additional contributions, and LIF withdrawals have annual maximums as well as annual minimums.

 – Registered Education Savings Plan – a tax-deferred account specifically for post-secondary education, with government grants available for contributions. Contribution rules can be complex.

 – First Home Savings Account – a tax-deferred / tax-free account specifically for people saving to buy their first home.  If a withdrawal is made for the purchase of a first home, the withdrawal is tax-free.  Contribution rules are complex, and rollover options exist to use the account if an investor decides not to purchase a home at all.

 – Registered Disability Savings Plan – a tax-deferred account specifically for individuals and families supporting a disabled person.  This account is quite complex and has a variety of contribution rules that are linked to individual or family income. Can be thought of as a “super-charged” RRSP.

A variety of other accounts do exist, but most are variations on the account types above, such as a Group RSP, Defined Contribution Pension Plan (DCPP), or Pooled RESP.

If you have any questions about your account types and how to use them most effectively, please reach out to me directly.

It’s an easy thing to get confused with all of the initialisms floating around for investment account types in Canada.  This document will run through the most common investment account types and provide a short description of their key features.

Investment Essentials: Account Initialisms Primer

With another eventful month behind us, this month’s Signal > Noise is going to be presented in a slightly different format – a short webinar.  We cover a lot of ground in under 20 minutes, and I’d love to hear your feedback on the conversation.

This month I had the opportunity to record a candid conversation between myself and fellow Portfolio Manager Mark Ting with the Vancouver FWP team.

This is an unrehearsed, open discussion covering some of today’s most pressing topics, including:

•        Inflation and the impact of new tariffs

•        The direction of global liquidity

•        Where interest rates may head next

•        Risks that could potentially bring markets down

•        And, of course, where the stock market might be headed from here

 What makes this conversation especially valuable is that it’s not a scripted consensus view. You’ll hear two seasoned professionals share their sometimes conflicting perspectives on the markets — which we think is both refreshing and thought-provoking.

 We believe you’ll find this short session both engaging and insightful.

If you’d like to discuss how these themes may affect your portfolio, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me directly.

Investment Essentials – Account Initialisms Primer

With all of the initialisms we Canadians have for investment account options, it’s easy to confuse account types and how or when they’re used. Please find a PDF attached to help you enhance your investment knowledge!

File Under “D’ for “Duh” – Bank Reps’ Conflicts of Interest

Every so often you see a headline that makes you think 

 but, to crudely paraphrase Lord Kelvin, 

“if it ain’t measured, it ain’t science”

 at the Big Five banks in Canada, with the byline: “Research “showed a statistically significant association” between sales pressure and recommendations not in client interests”.

 “The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) and the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization (CIRO) published a report detailing the results of a voluntary, anonymous survey of almost 2,900 reps at the fund dealers affiliated with the Big Five banks — BMO, CIBC, RBC, Scotiabank and TD Bank — which found that many reps report that they feel pressure to sell, which can result in product and service recommendations that aren’t in clients’ interests.

In particular, regulators found that the use of scorecards to track reps’ sales and other activities are tools that, “not only increase pressure to meet sales targets, but also influence the products recommended to clients, posing a risk to the interests of retail investors.””

Other findings included “that 32% of reps reported that their compensation was driven more by sales volumes than by the quality of their advice to clients”, and “a third of reps say that clients have sometimes received incorrect information about those recommendations; and that 25% said that clients have sometimes received recommendations that aren’t in their interests. 

Investor advocate groups have long been fighting for transparency for investors on important topics like relationship disclosures, determination of suitability, disclosure of fees, and accurate and consistent performance reporting.  In 2026, reporting disclosure standards will be enhanced again with the roll-out of Phase 3 of the Client Relationship Model (CRM3), with the goal of more clearly showing investors fees from all sources, and their “all in costs” of investing.

However, enhanced disclosures don’t prevent bad sales practices, so here are three tips investors can use to better protect themselves when obtaining financial advice.

If your advisor works directly for a fund company or bank fund dealer, asking what products are available on their “product shelf” can give you a good idea of if anything 

 then their own company’s funds are available.  This can vary within the firm.  A “Financial Planner” working at a bank’s retail branch may only be able to sell you the bank’s own line of mutual funds and ETFs, whereas an “Investment Advisor” working at the bank’s brokerage branch may have an open product shelf.

The alphabet soup of accreditations can be confusing and intimidating, and while most designations that grant post-nominal letters show a deeper level of knowledge and understanding, they are not all equal.  Further, while the most rigorous designations require a commitment to 

, they do not automatically mean your advisor 

In Canada, advisors that hold the CFA Institute’s 

 (CFP®), Canadian Securities Institute’s 

 (CIM®), or (after an upcoming update in 2026) the IAFP’s 

. However, that does not mean those advisors actually have a 

 to you…just that they could lose their accreditation if they do not act “as if”.

  These include corporate directors and officers (to their shareholders), Trustees (to the beneficiaries of a Trust), Attorneys (to their clients), and certain Financial Advisors.

In Canada, the quickest way to check if your Advisor is a fiduciary is whether or not you have a 

.  A discretionary manager (usually a Portfolio Manager or Associate Portfolio Manager) has the ability to make investment decisions and implement changes on your behalf.  They will use your Investment Policy Statement (IPS) document to outline your goals, important personal information and investment considerations, and include specific “guardrails” on asset allocation allowances. The IPS is a legal document and codifies the Portfolio Manager’s fiduciary duty to act in your best interest.

As a discretionary Portfolio Manager holding the CFA, CFP®, and CIM® designations, I have a fiduciary responsibility to always act in my clients' best interests.  If you’re not sure about your current financial advisor’s responsibilities to you, please feel free to reach out to me directly.

That’s all for this month!  As we continue into the fall, I’ll be addressing some year-end tips and planning preparation over the next few letters that you can take care of now, in order to keep the upcoming tax season as painless as possible 

Foundation Wealth Partners LP is registered as a Portfolio Manager and Exempt Market Dealer across Canada.

This information is provided for illustrative and discussion purposes only. This material is not intended as a formal research report and should not be relied upon as a basis for making an investment decision. Historical trends do not imply, forecast or guarantee future results. Information is as of the date indicated and subject to change without notice. Nothing herein constitutes a prediction or projection of future events or future market behavior.

We are not tax advisors.  Please speak to your accountant for more information.

I hope everyone has had a great start to the Fall, and for all those Halloween fans out there – welcome to spooky season!  (Fingers crossed that seasonal accolade won’t carry over to investment portfolios!)

Signal > Noise: September 2025

Signal to Noise September 2025

The introduction of studying behaviour in finance started with philosopher John Stuart Mill in his 1830 essay, 

On the Definition of Political Economy; and on the Method of Investigation Proper To It

, but is most popularly attributed to Scottish

economist Adam Smith’s creation of the fictional “Rational Economic Man”, expanding on the concept in his book, 

The fictional entity of the “Rational Economic Man” was used to explore theory around how an entity with perfect rational behaviour, and thus no emotions, would make economic decisions.

These were the beginning assumptions built into (eventually) well-known economic theories of interactions between supply-and-demand, and ultimately grew into the use of measuring the “utility” of decision making.

“In this formulation, an economic man does not have to act morally or responsibly; they don't even need to act rationally from the perspective of an outside observer. They only need to act in a way that allows them to attain pre-determined, narrow goals at the lowest possible cost. For example, if an angler in the Pacific Ocean can catch the same amount of fish with a disposable plastic net that they could with a more expensive hand-woven natural fiber net, they will choose the plastic net–even if that means they will eventually and unintentionally poison the fish that he depends on for their livelihood.”

This study of utility and decision-making became the field of 

Throughout the mid-1900s, economists, philosophers, mathematicians, and psychologists continued to explore the field, leading to developments in statistical theory and game theory, such as Nash’s Equilibrium Theory, the well-known Prisoners’ Dilemma (Flood and Drescher), Decision Analysis Framework (Howard), and the Expected Utility Theory (von Neumann and Morgenstern).

Outward progress took a breather there for the better part of 30 years.

All of the statistical analysis and study of decision making mentioned above continued to use the Rational Economic Man as its basis, ignoring the very-obvious fact that humankind rarely, if ever, makes perfectly unemotional decisions.

Von Neumann and Morgenstern’s expected utility theorem is one you’re probably familiar with, because you’ve seen a very simple example in my Risk Questionnaire:

If you had the option between taking $25,000 now, or flipping a coin with the chances to either win $60,000, or receive $0, which option would you take?

The “correct” answer according to the Rational Economic Man and the expected 

 of the choice is to take the 50/50 coin flip to win $60,000.

Expected Value = (50% x $60,000) + (50% x $0)

$30,000 > $25,000, therefore the “correct” answer is to take the coin flip.

However, and this is clear from the Risk Questionnaire results, lots of people don’t want to take the coin flip!

 more math here, but Von Neumann and Morgenstern’s Expected Utility Theory helps to explain why some people don’t want to take the choice by adding their “utility function” which takes into consideration factors 

 of the equation, in particular, the bias of 

Consider this simplified situation: for someone with only $5,000 in the bank, receiving $25,000 holds far too much utility to risk it all on a coin flip!

 of $25,000 is far more attractive than the 50% possibility of $60,000.

Did you know you were doing some very complex statistical analysis during that one question?

The study of decision making and expected utility continued throughout the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, but results kept coming back skewed from what was expected in either the classical Decision Making structures, or the new Expected Utility Theory.

Results leaned in the anticipated direction, supporting the research, but was often far from the mark.

Enter the godfathers of modern Behavioural Economics: 

In 1969, Kahneman proposed to Tversky that the skewed results being achieved in these studies were relying on two things that were not entirely correct:

People would be doing quick statistical math every time they were making a utility decision

People came to the table with no “baggage” that could influence their decisions

Running many experiments over the following years, they presented their conclusions in the 1973 paper, 

“In making predictions and judgments under uncertainty, people do not appear to follow the calculus of chance or the statistical theory of prediction.

 which sometimes yield reasonable judgments and sometimes lead to severe and systematic errors. Consequently, intuitive predictions are insensitive to the reliability of the evidence or to the prior probability of the outcome, in violation of the logic of statistical prediction.”

,) and is related to “finding” and “discovering”.

Interestingly, the same root word forms the modern day “Eureka!

In simplified terms, Kahneman and Tversky labelled heuristics as “rules of thumb”; common decision-making shortcuts that most people use in day-to-day life, because having to analyze every decision, every time, would be a horrible misallocation of resources.

Of course, sometimes the rules of thumb work, and sometimes they don’t.

, separates our thought processes into two systems: System 1 uses heuristics and biases to form fast opinions.

System 2 uses deliberation and testing to arrive at slower conclusions.

 – operates quickly and intuitively; your gut-reactions and snap judgments.

These include judging distances, providing direction when you hear a sudden noise, detecting anger in someone’s face or voice, answering 2 x 2 = ?, and (concerningly) driving your car down an empty highway.

These are “instinctive” processes, where learned heuristics and biases can give you a quick solution; your brain “saves” you from expending the energy.

 – labelled the “lazy system”, these are your slow thought processes, where intentional effort is being made.

Counter-intuitively, any time you’re focusing your attention on something, you’re engaging the lazy system so that you can get an accurate or measured response.

To demonstrate, this puzzle was presented in 

“For an example, here is a simple puzzle.

Do not try to solve it, but listen to your intuition:

The bat costs one dollar more than the ball.

The distinctive mark of this easy puzzle is that it evokes an answer that is simple, intuitive, and 

The researchers go on to point out that if the ball costs 10 cents, the total cost would be $1.10 + $0.10 = $1.20.

It is only when you engage your System 2 thinking that the correct answer becomes obvious; the ball costs 5 cents ($1.05 + $0.05 = $1.10).

Since your brain will almost always try to take shortcuts to save energy, answering quickly bypassed your System 2, which would have taken a few extra seconds to double-check the math.

Shane Frederick’s Cognitive Reflection Test

 provides two more examples of how your brain will process information fast, and then slow.

If it takes 5 machines 5 minutes to make 5 widgets, how long would it take 100 machines to make 100 widgets?

In a lake, there is a patch of lily pads.

If it takes 48 days for the lily pads to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half of the lake?

Through the subsequent decades, research on cognitive reflection, heuristics, and biases continued, further refining and analyzing how humans would approach solving problems.

However, issues continued to confound the desire of economists and statisticians to wrap mathematics around inherently socially learned biases.

Most problematic – humans kept acting differently when presented with similar choices!

 contains a discussion of how personal histories can form current biases.

As an abbreviated example, compare two people, both 50 years old, both engineers, both “equally successful” at face value.

However, one engineer came from a struggling immigrant family with no history of higher education, and the second came from a highly educated, wealthy household.

Despite their current equivalence, who do you think 

In practice, identifying these biases that may impact investor behaviours is incredibly important.

In the above example, the first engineer’s lived experience could mean that they are more likely to save or less likely to take risks (risk aversion / loss aversion biases).

Meanwhile, the second engineer, having come from a higher socio-economic background, may see their social circles spending more, influencing them to save less (anchoring / availability bias), or having not ever dealt with money issues could be convinced that stock-picking and portfolio management aren’t that hard (overconfidence bias).

Its clear to see that despite their current equivalent status, these are two very different investors.

 clearly these days between generations with different life experiences.

Though this is true for every generation, right now it is most obvious between “Boomers” and “Millennials”.

“Boomers” have experienced most of their career during a time of reasonable “aspirational education”, where getting a Masters or Ph.D would nearly guarantee higher employment and salaries, whereas “Millennials" have lived through a time when Starbucks baristas are being asked for a Bachelors degree, and a Masters is nearly the price of admission for many careers.

“Boomers” came into their adult years during a period of inflation and exceptionally high interest rates.

“Millennials” came into maturity watching the 2000 Tech Bubble burst and the 2008 Great Financial Crisis, leading to a “lost decade” for market returns.

Stop for a moment here and consider what beliefs about money and investing you have, where those came from, and how that might influence your own heuristics and biases.

 more likely to want to pay for your kids’ educations.

Did you live through a period of severe financial instability?

 more likely that you are highly sensitive to the change of values in your investment accounts.

Its crucial that we talk about your “money history”, so that we can understand together the unique view you have on life, and what success means to you.

Armed with this information and understanding, I can better help you achieve your “money future”.

To put names to the heuristics and biases that form our “financial emotions” and lead to investor blind spots, this is a list of the top 5 investor biases affecting investment performance: 

 – the reluctance to change from your current position

 – the unwillingness to realize a loss on an investment

The introduction of studying behaviour in finance started with philosopher John Stuart Mill in his 1830 essay, On the Definition of Political Economy; and on the Method of Investigation Proper To It, but is most popularly attributed to Scottish economist Adam Smith’s creation of the fictional “Rational Economic Man”, expanding on the concept in his book, The Wealth of Nations.

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