2015 (110 articles)

Categories: investment, News

Deciding how to weight your portfolio

Asset allocation is the bedrock of successful investing. The challenge for investors lies in deciding exactly how much to allocate to each asset class.

Categories: investment, News

Investing in bonds, pooling your money with thousands of other small investors

Bonds are debt issued by either a government or a company and are an essential building block of many investors’ portfolios. When you buy a bond, you are effectively extending a loan to the issuer of the bond.

Categories: investment, News

Professionally managed collective investment funds

Unit trusts and open-ended investment companies (OEICs) are professionally managed collective investment funds. Managers pool money from many investors and buy shares, bonds, property or cash assets and other investments. An open-ended fund could be visualised as a big pool of money – the money belongs to thousands of small investors.

Categories: investment, News

Invest as much of your annual ISA allowance as you like in either a Stocks & Shares ISA or a Cash ISA, or any mixture of the two

Some people never look beyond Cash Individual Savings Accounts (ISAs), but by using Stocks & Shares ISAs too, you could get a higher return on your investment. Stocks & Shares ISAs can contain shares, bonds and investment funds. There are no restrictions about where in the world you can invest: it does not have to be all in the UK.

Categories: investment, Retirement

Planning for retirement in the new pensions landscape

The new pension savings market offers much more flexibility and choice post–6 April this year, which is a positive, but it can be overwhelming. For people planning for retirement in the new world of pension freedoms, there are both risks and opportunities – from passing on your pension to loved ones, to making the most of tax relief.

Categories: News, Retirement

Divorcees may need to take action to protect benefits following pension reforms

An unintended consequence of the pension reforms is that any divorcee with a pension earmarking order may need to act fast to protect their benefits. Any earmarking order that provides the ex-spouse with a fixed percentage of the pension income in retirement should be checked to ensure benefits are protected now that the member no longer needs to take their pension as an income and can instead take all the cash out as a lump sum.

Categories: investment, News

UK PLCs most widely held by investment companies

Which UK companies have investment company managers been favouring? With the UK in the spotlight, the Association of Investment Companies (AIC) has published details of which UK companies are held by the highest number of investment companies in their top holdings.

Categories: News, Retirement

More than one in ten would use parents’ pension on mortgage deposit

More than one in ten (12%) 20-35 year olds are prepared to ask their parents to access pension savings to help pay for a mortgage deposit, research from Old Mutual Wealth[1] shows. But only half as many over 55s are willing to use their pension to help children or grandchildren buy a home.

Categories: investment, News, Protection, Wealth Creation

UK parents spend £28 billion on nation’s under-fives each year

UK parents spend around £35,000 on their children by the time they reach their fifth birthday, according to research released by Aviva. This adds up to a total of more than £28 billion[1] spent on the nation’s 4 million under-fives each year.

Categories: News, Retirement

Two-thirds of people aged 55 and over believe financial advice should be compulsory at retirement

Two-thirds (65%) of people aged 55 and over who are not yet retired believe that it should be compulsory to receive financial advice at retirement according to findings from Retirement Advantage.