The ice is thawing for the many Canadian investors who have been frozen into inaction since the financial storm of 2008.

Fund companies and financial advisors report a higher level of activity this RRSP season than they’ve seen in a couple of years — and a greater willingness on the part of investors to venture out a little further along the risk curve to include more exposure to equities in their portfolios.

“We’re seeing the mood improve, and there’s a lot of sales momentum,” says David Richardson, vice president, enterprise sales and group financial services, with RBC Global Asset Management Inc. in Toronto. “There’s a lot more confidence on the part of inves-tors, the economic news has largely been better and we’ve been experiencing a relatively calm period in equities markets without frightening downswings. A lot of people found it hard to take action last year. But this year, sales are definitely up.”

Mary Taylor, senior vice president of product and marketing with Mackenzie Financial Corp. in Toronto, says that as market indices and fund performance stage a recovery, investors are showing greater willingness to hold more stocks. She’s hearing from advisors that they are busier with clients, and Mackenzie is seeing an increase in requests to do seminars for advisors’ clients.

Relative to the past couple of years, Taylor adds, Mackenzie has noticed a pickup in some of its value-oriented global equities funds with strong long-term track records, including Mackenzie Cundill Value, Mackenzie Cundill Recovery and Mackenzie Ivy Foreign funds.

“People were badly burned and they still remember it,” Taylor says. “At the same time, they need to follow a financial plan. And although they must deal with fluctuations in value with equities, they face different risks if they stay away from equities entirely.”

Toronto-based Dynamic Mutual Funds Ltd. is on a roll, fuelled by outstanding investment performance. Jordy Chilcott, executive vice president, reports a 20% increase in net sales from last year’s record highs.

“The numbers tell us consumers are more confident and we’re cornering a larger market share,” Chilcott says. “Balanced and income funds are leading the way.”

The firm’s top seller is Dynamic Strategic Yield, a “go anywhere” fund that includes Canadian and U.S. stocks, income trusts, Canadian government bonds, corporate bonds, foreign bonds and real estate investment trusts; it currently has a yield of 5.2%. The next biggest seller is Dynamic Power Balanced, followed by Dynamic Value Balanced. As investors get braver, some are venturing into equities, with Dynamic Value Fund of Canada being the most popular stock fund.

“We’re seeing a progression,” says Chilcott, “as investors move from the fixed-income funds, they had been favouring to balanced funds.”@page_break@Chilcott adds that Dynamic is also “getting traction” in its hedge funds, which have greater investment freedom than its regular mutual funds.

Toronto-based Franklin Templeton Investments Corp. has found in its latest national research, released earlier this year, that although the S&P/TSX composite index has climbed back close to its peak, almost 39% of Canadian investors describe their investment personality as “suspicious or timid,” while 31% say they are “analytical, risk-taking or opportunistic.” (See page 20.)

James Cook, Templeton’s executive vice president of strategic initiatives, says investors are showing a strong interest in global fixed-income products that offer the opportunity for an enhanced yield relative to Canadian bonds.

Templeton’s most popular product is Quotential Diversified Income Portfolio, which requires a minimum investment of $25,000 and offers a mix of global bonds and dividend-paying stocks. Quotential Balanced Income and Quotential Balanced Growth, which offer higher equities exposure, are also in favour.

“The portfolio products are appealing to investors,” Cook says. “The funds are dynamically rebalanced, which means inves-tors don’t have to make the call on whether to scale back on certain asset classes or let them run; it’s all done by the [portfolio] manager.”

Among Templeton’s individual funds, Franklin Templeton Global Bond Fund is the most popular.

There is also growing interest in emerging-markets funds as investors lose their fear of the high risk and volatility in emerging countries, Cook says: “Investors are becoming increasingly aware of the opportunities in emerging markets as their growth rates exceed developing countries. Emerging markets are no longer emerging. They’re here to stay, and investors want to participate in their superior growth.”

Dennis Yanchus, manager of statistics and research with the Investment Funds Institute of Canada, says investors are now diversifying across fixed-income assets in the same fashion as with equities as they seek higher yields in the frustratingly low interest rate environment.

Investors also like the idea of lowering risk, he says, by spreading their fixed-income assets among geographical regions, maturities and types of securities. There are also tactical income funds that opportunistically shift their emphasis among different income products as conditions change. A similar asset mix is available through exchange-traded funds.

There is some concern that fixed-income funds, particularly those focusing on longer-term maturities, could be hurt by rising interest rates, which would decrease the attractiveness of bonds issued previously at relatively lower rates. This could result in capital losses on bonds sold prior to maturity, meaning that bonds are not the safe asset that some investors have come to expect after many years of declining interest rates and healthy fixed-income returns. IE