Does anyone know of a good site that will allow me to find Canadian index funds available? And, is there a site that will allow me to compare funds offered by different institutions?

ETF Guy answered:
Just like in the US, Barclays is a big index fund / ETF player in Canada. In the US their products fall under the iShares brand, but in Canada they're under the iUnits brand which you can read about at http://www.ishares.ca/. As you would expect, there is an ETF that tracks the TSX which is probably a good place to start.

strath answered:
What about ETFs - exchange-traded funds. These are based on indexes but their management costs are even lower than index mutual funds.

Largest family of ETFs in Canada by far is run by Barclay's Global Investors. No, not promoting them, it's just a fact. They also run an even greater number of US ETFs. You can find the US list at ishares.com.
For Canadian ETFs go to ishares.ca. Click on each of the tabs at the left to see the selection. A big broad-based ETF has the symbol XIU (under market cap tab). This one contains the top 60 TSX traded companies. It is, therefore, a conservative pick.

There are sector ishares - Canadian energy, financial, gold, etc. Also two or three bond ishares plus one based on the MSCI global index. One buys these ishares through a broker. Discount brokers are useful here if you wish to keep your management costs to a minimum.

One doesn't need to compare such ETFs because their price will fluctuate exactly according to the index each one contains. So any one management company's product will be the same as another company's product pegged to the same index.

muncie birder answered:
There are not a great deal of Canandian Index funds. I know of one-- EWC. Expense ratio= 0.59%. Ten year growth rate 13.84% annually--not bad at all. The S&P 500 should perform so well.
By funds offered by different institutions, do you mean mutual funds? Yahoo finance. Forbes Morningstar.

Ron Mexico answered:
Use Morningstar.

cool_01 answered:
The Ethical Canadian Index Fund aims to provide long-term growth through capital appreciation by tracking the performance of the Ethical Canadian Index. It follows a sustainable approach to investing.
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