Luckily, investing in international equities has by no means been simpler for Canadians. Trading fees proceed to edge downward for shares listed on U.S. and worldwide inventory exchanges, and there are a whole bunch of low-fee exchange-traded funds (ETFs) invested in international shares to select from proper right here in Canada.

Plus, if you happen to’re concerned about particular international shares—say, Nvidia or SAP—increasingly more equities can be found in Canada within the type of Canadian depository receipts (CDRs). Within the first quarter of 2025, Canada’s two CDR issuers, CIBC and BMO, expanded their roster of CDRs past U.S.-listed shares to incorporate shares listed solely in European and Japanese markets. About 100 main international corporations at the moment are obtainable in CDR kind. You will get publicity to world-beating shares, in different phrases, with out leaving the consolation of Canadian markets.

What’s a depository receipt?

A depository receipt is a safety, issued by a financial institution, that trades on a inventory alternate, very similar to shares and ETFs. A CDR is invested fully in a single underlying inventory and so serves as a proxy for proudly owning that inventory. Certainly, the depository receipt pays the identical dividend yield because the inventory and even grant the holder a say in corporate governance (with some limitations—see beneath). Why hassle with this sophisticated construction? For sure traders, proudly owning depository receipts as an alternative of the inventory itself provides benefits.

CDRs, first launched by CIBC in 2021, had been predated by American depositary receipts (ADRs). These U.S.-listed proxies for international shares gave American traders entry to worldwide equities with out the usually larger buying and selling prices, international alternate charges and foreign money threat concerned with holding these shares immediately. CDRs are designed to offer Canadian traders the identical comfort and price advantages, just for shares traded exterior Canada, together with U.S. shares. CDRs commerce on the Cboe Canada exchange.

What are the potential advantages of CDRs?

Investing in CDRs has three key benefits, in contrast with shopping for international shares immediately:

1. Relying on the charges your brokerage costs, CDRs could include decrease buying and selling prices than the underlying shares, as a result of CDRs are traded on home quite than international markets and keep away from brokers’ international alternate charges.
2. CDRs are sometimes priced at lower than $50, making them simpler to buy than the total international shares, which might price a whole bunch and even 1000’s of {dollars}. For instance, if you happen to balk at paying USD$950 for a single Netflix share, you may get basically the identical publicity by shopping for CIBC’s Netflix CDR (NFLX) on the Cboe alternate for underneath CAD$40. On this respect, CDRs are just like fractional shares provided by some brokerages.
3. CDRs are notionally hedged into Canadian {dollars}. That’s, you purchase it for a value that displays your fairness holding on the alternate fee that day (just like a CAD-hedged ETF). However value actions thereafter are hedged to trace the ups and downs within the inventory’s value in its dwelling foreign money. This implies there isn’t any foreign money threat, and you’ll take pleasure in related capital good points (and losses) as if you happen to had been investing in U.S. {dollars}, euros or yen.

What are the drawbacks of CDRs?

Canadian traders ought to concentrate on these particulars earlier than buying CDRs:

• All these benefits come for a price, albeit a small one. CIBC and BMO don’t cost direct administration charges on their CDRs, however they do earn a reduce of the foreign money hedging that goes into them. BMO says its annual hedging price is “sometimes underneath 0.5% per yr.” Based on CIBC, the international alternate unfold—the distinction between Canadian-dollar purchase and promote costs—quantities to a most of 0.8% per yr on its international CDRs.
• Within the 4 years that CDRs have been obtainable in Canada, their efficiency has not precisely tracked the shares they mimic, largely because of the price and imprecise nature of the hedging course of. The CDRs of a number of notable shares have lagged the good points of their fashions by a couple of proportion factors per yr.
• Though they’re listed in Canada, CDRs are handled like international shares for tax functions. In taxable accounts, dividends from CDRs don’t profit from the dividend tax credit like Canadian shares do. CDR dividends are additionally topic to withholding taxes within the international locations the place the underlying shares commerce. For instance, 15% if the underlying shares are American. That is no completely different than if you happen to owned international shares immediately, although.
• CDR holders don’t mechanically obtain voting supplies and the opposite paperwork that shareholders do. In the event that they wish to take part in company governance, they need to make their voting intentions identified, usually earlier than the voting deadline, to the CDR issuer. Additionally they can’t tender their securities on to an acquirer within the case of a takeover bid however should as an alternative promote on the present market value earlier than the deal’s shut.

The place can I purchase CDRs in Canada?

You’ll be able to typically purchase CDRs utilizing the same brokerage account or funding advisor you utilize to purchase shares and ETFs. Since nearly all CDRs symbolize sought-after multinational shares, liquidity shouldn’t be a difficulty.

Take care, although, to make sure your orders are correctly labelled—the ticker symbols utilized by CDRs usually resemble these of the underlying shares listed overseas. For instance, CIBC’s Lululemon Athletica CDR goes by LULU on the Cboe alternate, precisely the identical as LULU inventory buying and selling on the Nasdaq. The primary will set you again 15 bucks Canadian, the second over USD$300.