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Savings and Investments thread

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  • WSS said:

    Got a bit of cash since my newborn came into the world. Thinking of chucking them into some premium bonds (just a couple of hundred) as a starter for him?

    Good idea?

    A Junior ISA would be better - usually higher rates than standard ISAs.
  • bobmunro said:

    WSS said:

    Got a bit of cash since my newborn came into the world. Thinking of chucking them into some premium bonds (just a couple of hundred) as a starter for him?

    Good idea?

    A Junior ISA would be better - usually higher rates than standard ISAs.
    Looked at those as well. Would probably do that post "gift money" and pay in regularly. Probably me liking the chance of winning big with ERNIE!
  • If you are a cautious investor buying some premium bonds is a good idea while interest rates are low. However if there is a significant rise in rates you would need to reassess.
  • WSS said:

    bobmunro said:

    WSS said:

    Got a bit of cash since my newborn came into the world. Thinking of chucking them into some premium bonds (just a couple of hundred) as a starter for him?

    Good idea?

    A Junior ISA would be better - usually higher rates than standard ISAs.
    Looked at those as well. Would probably do that post "gift money" and pay in regularly. Probably me liking the chance of winning big with ERNIE!
    do HBoS Regular saver rather than an ISA. Pays a decent interest rate and you have PoA so when the little one hits age of 17 and 360 days you can take it all out and put in your own name so they dont piss it all up the wall in their 19th year! ISA is in your kids name and you lose all control...
  • Out of interest(and being lazy) what's the maximum limit per year you can stick in premium bonds, I assume there's one.
  • edited February 2017

    Out of interest(and being lazy) what's the maximum limit per year you can stick in premium bonds, I assume there's one.

    £50K is the most you can hold in your name. I don't think it matters when you buy them.
  • Thank you, I'm assuming you'd get a selection of wins for that, I like the fact it's a safe option.
  • Junior ISAs are quite attractive given the tax reliefs, but the money is locked away and can't be touched until he/she turns 18 and importantly the money then becomes theirs solely and you have no control over what they splash it on.

    You may have been thinking about funding college fees and they may have a month's all-inclusive holiday at a five-star resort in mind.
  • Junior isa isn't a bad rate for him as long as I keep an isa with them as well.
  • Suggest all you devotees of Hargreaves Lansdown read the article in this evenings ES questioning why it has such loyal customers who bear charges that give HL a 70% profit margin. Tesco make 4% and real estate investors make 16%.

    If your fund manager makes a 4% gross return 1.4% disappears in charges between HL and the manager. The wholesale price of the same funds allowing for a profit to the fund manager is less than 0.05%.

    The scandal is that the charges are a % of fund value when it costs the same to manage an account of £500 as one of £50,000.
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  • Suggest all you devotees of Hargreaves Lansdown read the article in this evenings ES questioning why it has such loyal customers who bear charges that give HL a 70% profit margin. Tesco make 4% and real estate investors make 16%.

    If your fund manager makes a 4% gross return 1.4% disappears in charges between HL and the manager. The wholesale price of the same funds allowing for a profit to the fund manager is less than 0.05%.

    The scandal is that the charges are a % of fund value when it costs the same to manage an account of £500 as one of £50,000.

    Well when you have a better option, I am ready to move my SIPP. And I believe you are working on a better option...
  • Suggest all you devotees of Hargreaves Lansdown read the article in this evenings ES questioning why it has such loyal customers who bear charges that give HL a 70% profit margin. Tesco make 4% and real estate investors make 16%.

    If your fund manager makes a 4% gross return 1.4% disappears in charges between HL and the manager. The wholesale price of the same funds allowing for a profit to the fund manager is less than 0.05%.

    The scandal is that the charges are a % of fund value when it costs the same to manage an account of £500 as one of £50,000.

    Well when you have a better option, I am ready to move my SIPP. And I believe you are working on a better option...
    Spent today giving Pension Regulator a run through our proposition before launch.

    It would be inappropriate, if not illegal, for me to promote any scheme, suffice it to say it should be possible, as a counter to the HL model, for the market to offer a scheme with a fund charge of 0.75% charge for a default balanced fund including account administration, and flat fee of £75 for optional regulated advice on self select funds.
  • Right then, thoughts on gold?

    I've always been wary of it. Equally wary of the type of people who enthuse about it. Flat earthers, conspiracy theorists, Brexiteers etc :-). At least that's been my experience.

    But a Czech friend who is none of those things, has set up a business offering physical gold. He's an ex P&G marketeer, rational as they come; so today I got him to make his pitch.

    His argument for it is deffo not as a way to get rich, but as a solid base which remains when other things go pear. He worked for a bank after P&G and that's where he learnt that banks only actually possess about 12-14% of the cash they allegedly hold on paper. That's a chilling thought. He told me spontaneously that he personally has about 6% of his savings in physical gold.

    His operation sells gold "bars" which are about the size of a Swan Vestas matchbox, but wafer thin. So highly transportable when you are exiting in a hurry when Putin reclaims Prague. It means that at home you could easily hide them in an unlikely place, which thieves would overlook while they search for a safe.

    One thing I found a bit unpalatable was that there is a price bid-offer spread of about 20%. So you lose 20% of value immediately. To which he countered that the fees of fund managers are a continuous drain on such investments, this is a one off. On the other hand when it comes to a fluctuating gold price, he has set up so that people can buy in regular small monthly instalments on the same day each month (as you can do with funds) thus avoiding the pain of plunging in just before the gold price does the opposite of what everyone forecast.

    We discussed that there are "physical gold" funds with a bid/offer spread of maybe 1.5% rather than 20%, but his view is that again, these funds at any one time only have physical possession of a fraction of the amount invested in their 'gold'. So there is still the risk. Something could go wrong with the fund, at times of severe financial stress. You could on the other hand stick your physical gold in your inside pockets, and leave the country with maybe £50k worth, and no one can stop you and no one will notice.

    He wasn't pretending there is anything unique about his own business. While it is unusual in CZ, he said there will be about 300 such businesses in Germany, so doubtless similar in the UK.

    Will be very interested in thoughts on this.
  • TwoSheds says Buy
  • Right then, thoughts on gold?

    I've always been wary of it. Equally wary of the type of people who enthuse about it. Flat earthers, conspiracy theorists, Brexiteers etc :-). At least that's been my experience.

    But a Czech friend who is none of those things, has set up a business offering physical gold. He's an ex P&G marketeer, rational as they come; so today I got him to make his pitch.

    His argument for it is deffo not as a way to get rich, but as a solid base which remains when other things go pear. He worked for a bank after P&G and that's where he learnt that banks only actually possess about 12-14% of the cash they allegedly hold on paper. That's a chilling thought. He told me spontaneously that he personally has about 6% of his savings in physical gold.

    His operation sells gold "bars" which are about the size of a Swan Vestas matchbox, but wafer thin. So highly transportable when you are exiting in a hurry when Putin reclaims Prague. It means that at home you could easily hide them in an unlikely place, which thieves would overlook while they search for a safe.

    One thing I found a bit unpalatable was that there is a price bid-offer spread of about 20%. So you lose 20% of value immediately. To which he countered that the fees of fund managers are a continuous drain on such investments, this is a one off. On the other hand when it comes to a fluctuating gold price, he has set up so that people can buy in regular small monthly instalments on the same day each month (as you can do with funds) thus avoiding the pain of plunging in just before the gold price does the opposite of what everyone forecast.

    We discussed that there are "physical gold" funds with a bid/offer spread of maybe 1.5% rather than 20%, but his view is that again, these funds at any one time only have physical possession of a fraction of the amount invested in their 'gold'. So there is still the risk. Something could go wrong with the fund, at times of severe financial stress. You could on the other hand stick your physical gold in your inside pockets, and leave the country with maybe £50k worth, and no one can stop you and no one will notice.

    He wasn't pretending there is anything unique about his own business. While it is unusual in CZ, he said there will be about 300 such businesses in Germany, so doubtless similar in the UK.

    Will be very interested in thoughts on this.

    Don't know too much about this topic having briefly researched it a couple of years ago but his offer seems like one helluva spread to me and then beware the exit costs if you sell it back to him. Check too that his gold would be accepted by other dealers if you wanted to sell elsewhere.
    Also have a look at Bullion Star in Singapore, they appeared top notch, cheap and a good reputation when I was nosing around.
    How about Valley Gold? :wink:
  • edited February 2017

    Right then, thoughts on gold?

    I've always been wary of it. Equally wary of the type of people who enthuse about it. Flat earthers, conspiracy theorists, Brexiteers etc :-). At least that's been my experience.

    But a Czech friend who is none of those things, has set up a business offering physical gold. He's an ex P&G marketeer, rational as they come; so today I got him to make his pitch.

    His argument for it is deffo not as a way to get rich, but as a solid base which remains when other things go pear. He worked for a bank after P&G and that's where he learnt that banks only actually possess about 12-14% of the cash they allegedly hold on paper. That's a chilling thought. He told me spontaneously that he personally has about 6% of his savings in physical gold.

    His operation sells gold "bars" which are about the size of a Swan Vestas matchbox, but wafer thin. So highly transportable when you are exiting in a hurry when Putin reclaims Prague. It means that at home you could easily hide them in an unlikely place, which thieves would overlook while they search for a safe.

    One thing I found a bit unpalatable was that there is a price bid-offer spread of about 20%. So you lose 20% of value immediately. To which he countered that the fees of fund managers are a continuous drain on such investments, this is a one off. On the other hand when it comes to a fluctuating gold price, he has set up so that people can buy in regular small monthly instalments on the same day each month (as you can do with funds) thus avoiding the pain of plunging in just before the gold price does the opposite of what everyone forecast.

    We discussed that there are "physical gold" funds with a bid/offer spread of maybe 1.5% rather than 20%, but his view is that again, these funds at any one time only have physical possession of a fraction of the amount invested in their 'gold'. So there is still the risk. Something could go wrong with the fund, at times of severe financial stress. You could on the other hand stick your physical gold in your inside pockets, and leave the country with maybe £50k worth, and no one can stop you and no one will notice.

    He wasn't pretending there is anything unique about his own business. While it is unusual in CZ, he said there will be about 300 such businesses in Germany, so doubtless similar in the UK.

    Will be very interested in thoughts on this.

    Don't know too much about this topic having briefly researched it a couple of years ago but his offer seems like one helluva spread to me and then beware the exit costs if you sell it back to him. Check too that his gold would be accepted by other dealers if you wanted to sell elsewhere.
    Also have a look at Bullion Star in Singapore, they appeared top notch, cheap and a good reputation when I was nosing around.
    How about Valley Gold? :wink:
    Not sure about VG, you invest in it, if they find a nugget, they sell it on, you don't see anything other than a star of tomorrow going into someone else's piece of jewellery.
  • Gold is a commodity that has no value apart from being highly liquid and a guaranteed value where you are reduced to bartering.

    Stocks have a theoretical value based on generating future revenue, with liquidity falling in a catastrophe scenario.

    So holding gold produces no revenue, the only logical reason for holding gold is to protect capital.

    The market in gold is created by holders of gold having different views on how safe are alternative places to put their capital. The price fluctuation is down to how much demand comes from the black market and how sentiment changes by holders of gold plus the intervention of speculators.

    Whereas the price of stocks represents value of future revenue earned, the price of gold has no statistical base of evaluation, it is random, based entirely on unpredictable sentiment. That's all Buffett is saying. He makes investments based on critical analysis of the financials, gold has a random value that defies any economic evaluation or application of statistics.

    If you are worried about a leveraged gold fund failing you don't believe in gold as a guarantee of capital in times of "severe financial stress". Why would the majority of holders of gold units all want to convert gold to cash at the same time if gold is the ultimate safe haven. A 33% leveraged gold fund means you obtain a return as if you had £100 of gold but only use £66 of cash.

    Buying real gold means you pay £100 for the gold but you don't have £33 to invest in an income producing investment and you have to pay for it to be stored and moved around as it is traded.

    Gold traders you buy gold from also trade on their own account. They not only make a guaranteed profit, they can manipulate the market to cover their own position at the expense of their clients.

    All developed economies left the gold standard some time ago, having to hold gold to the value of the money they print, or face currency devaluation. Money tied up in gold sitting in vaults is seen as better employed making stuff in the economy.

    It's reckoned the same £1 of cash put into circulation for consumers to spend gets spent 7 times as it moves between retailers/producers/employee wages. That's why governments encourage debt to increase spending and boost economic activity and no longer hold money in gold, a "sterile" asset as Buffett calls it.

    Of course all this debt, combined with artificial money, mispricing of risk, and distorted currency values might lead to a monumental collapse of financial markets to align with the real economy, and a clamour for gold.

    I think this is where I came in!
  • I've bought a fair bit of gold over the years, mainly sovereign coins as they are still classed as legal tender so no CGT. It wasn't too long ago (10 years) a full sovereign was £70-80, now about £250.
  • Anyone got any tips on mortgages? About to try and move home, broker recommended virgin money , any good?
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  • Plenty of mortgage search engines online,
  • @golfaddick advises on mortgages.
  • 4 x £25 this month
  • Invest in art
  • 3x25.i win more than Charlton.lol
  • shine166 said:

    Invest in art

    I would agree - an element of a portfolio at least.

    But you do need a good art dealer, one who is good at spotting talent early.
  • cazo said:

    3x25.i win more than Charlton.lol

    Me too. 2 x £25. A little bit of fun - more than looking at the interest I would have "earned"...
  • bobmunro said:

    shine166 said:

    Invest in art

    I would agree - an element of a portfolio at least.

    But you do need a good art dealer, one who is good at spotting talent early.
    Thomas Driesen
  • 4 x £25 this month

    £25. Meh. And I committed to buy Large a beer for this...
  • bobmunro said:

    shine166 said:

    Invest in art

    I would agree - an element of a portfolio at least.

    But you do need a good art dealer, one who is good at spotting talent early.
    I can help you out with some street artists names that will do well in the next 5 years... even if you just want to have a google and check the work
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