Trading the stockmarket (NO Referrals)

Vanguard now has the their own S&P 500 tracker on their own platform.


they have made a load of new funds available, worth a look around if you shop with them already.
Yeah I was watching Ramin on Pensioncraft on youtube last night, will have a mooch around as it's coming up to my yearly rebalancing.
Even though I'm old I've still got a fair chunk in the S & P. Always considered higher risk but you can't say no to the gains, and I'm loath to de risk my portfolio for a while yet.
 
Yeah I was watching Ramin on Pensioncraft on youtube last night, will have a mooch around as it's coming up to my yearly rebalancing.
Even though I'm old I've still got a fair chunk in the S & P. Always considered higher risk but you can't say no to the gains, and I'm loath to de risk my portfolio for a while yet.
yeah, a lot of retirement pensions/funds get this wrong.. I plan to retire as early as possible but live a long healthy life... my granparents lived until their 90s, my parents are getting into their 90s now.

so if I retire at 65 I still could have 25 years of investings left so switching to bonds at 65 and some penisons start the bonds and shares much earlier, it could mean that I'm leaving a lot on the table, heck even if they are still shares when I meet the great accountant.. then there be some lucky family and friends. Hence why I've gone for a 60/40 rather than the set retirement date.

If your S&P shares are vanguards', it may be possible to transfer them directly to Vanguard without out having to bed and switch.
 
yeah, a lot of retirement pensions/funds get this wrong.. I plan to retire as early as possible but live a long healthy life... my granparents lived until their 90s, my parents are getting into their 90s now.

so if I retire at 65 I still could have 25 years of investings left so switching to bonds at 65 and some penisons start the bonds and shares much earlier, it could mean that I'm leaving a lot on the table, heck even if they are still shares when I meet the great accountant.. then there be some lucky family and friends. Hence why I've gone for a 60/40 rather than the set retirement date.

If your S&P shares are vanguards', it may be possible to transfer them directly to Vanguard without out having to bed and switch.
I've done the sell/switch into the S & P accumulation fund this morning, it always annoyed me having to reinvest the dividends manually. Now I can forget about it for a while.
My main chunk is still 80/20, will move that to a 70/30 in the next year or so and probably stay there.
 
Anyone making use of a work-provided ShareSave scheme or similar? With the generous spot discounting and the downside risk being only inflation, it seems like a no brainer in terms of expected value and the best way for me to 'invest' any spare funds each month. Am I missing anything?

You can invest £100-£500 per month in 3 or 5 year lock ins and it's a pretty large / stable / low risk / asset-heavy utility with a strong balance sheet.
 
I’ve just sent the order to stop buying 60/40 and start to buy 80/20… the funds that are in the 60/40 can just stay there. who knew the bond market would do so badly…

waiting for my Share Save and SAYE to mature or become tax free before switching them to S&P500, thou that’s still have years left..

my savings can just stay in my savings account for now, over 5% risk free return until it’s starts returning over 1k a year, there’s nothing to worry about.
 
Anyone making use of a work-provided ShareSave scheme or similar? With the generous spot discounting and the downside risk being only inflation, it seems like a no brainer in terms of expected value and the best way for me to 'invest' any spare funds each month. Am I missing anything?

You can invest £100-£500 per month in 3 or 5 year lock ins and it's a pretty large / stable / low risk / asset-heavy utility with a strong balance sheet.
yes, that’s what started me in my investment journey..

i’m averaging into mine every year, some people have invested heavily in a single year only to find that the year after is a cheaper/better scheme.

it all depends on the offering, mine is offering shares at 2/3 of the last 3 months average price for either 3 or 5 years.. 600 pounds max per month for all plans that I’m enrolled in. At the end of the 3 or 5 years, I can see the current price and choice to take my money back or the shares.

if it’s ok, I would go 50-100 pounds per month for 3 years.. if it’s great then it’s 100-200 pounds for 5 years. My aim is to have a scheme maturing every year, rather than having to wait for every 3 or 5 years.

inflation shouldn’t be as much as an issue now, as the government has set the law so that cash is generating interest at the inflation rate set by the BoE.

the downsides is if you leave the company in whatever way, if you are forced to leave the company may offer some grace period for you to decide cash in on the shares or they just may just return your money. If you choice to leave, they just may return your money.

conversion/transactions fees of the platform may outweigh the returns, you just have to do the maths at the time of mutuality.

capital gains tax is the other thing to look out for, some people invested heavy a few years back and saw a return of 45% per share, they either had to pay capital gains tax or hold the shares and pay the platform fees… this was another reason for me to average in to a few schemes rather than take a large bite of a single one. The platform fee ain’t to bad for the bottom feeders like me, but they scale according to amount in the account without any upper limits as some of my colleagues will have millions in there.
 
Eugh.. they don't make it easy.... I just discovered that any other income that you receive is added on to your salary when it comes to the tax brackets.

say if you managed to lower your salary before tax and NI to £50K, but you have savings that will generate £750 interest and shares dividend that will generate £500... this will take you abover the £50,270 so you will have to pay taxes on the £250 of the £750 from personal savings interest at the 40% tax bracket.

 
Eugh.. they don't make it easy.... I just discovered that any other income that you receive is added on to your salary when it comes to the tax brackets.

say if you managed to lower your salary before tax and NI to £50K, but you have savings that will generate £750 interest and shares dividend that will generate £500... this will take you abover the £50,270 so you will have to pay taxes on the £250 of the £750 from personal savings interest at the 40% tax bracket.

Yeah it is annoying AF. I played ignorance the last few years, but this year I'll put it into an ISA.

Edit: I wonder if the ISA wrapper is also affected? Dammit
 
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Eugh.. they don't make it easy.... I just discovered that any other income that you receive is added on to your salary when it comes to the tax brackets.

say if you managed to lower your salary before tax and NI to £50K, but you have savings that will generate £750 interest and shares dividend that will generate £500... this will take you abover the £50,270 so you will have to pay taxes on the £250 of the £750 from personal savings interest at the 40% tax bracket.


Personally the mindset of capping your salary to dodge the 40% rate isn't a positive one. If someone offered you a £100k salary would you say no because of the tax band? You only pay tax on the difference so whether that's £1 or £50k it shouldn't matter.

Just earn what you can earn, make financial decisions based on your life and goals, and pay what owe. Life's too short to be worried about paying 40% tax on £750.

But then as someone with lots of family and friends who work in the NHS I can barely see the fence in terms of paying taxes. Imo you simply can't avoid tax in one breath and then complain about anything that's publicly funded in the next (not saying you do/are.... but lots do!).
 
Yeah it is annoying AF. I played ignorance the last few years, but this year I'll put it into an ISA.

Edit: I wonder if the ISA wrapper is also affected? Dammit
ISA wrappers are not affected, it's only incomes that are normally taxable. For me it's my interest from savings account, capital gains and interest from my two (one personal and one with work) trading accounts.

Personally the mindset of capping your salary to dodge the 40% rate isn't a positive one. If someone offered you a £100k salary would you say no because of the tax band? You only pay tax on the difference so whether that's £1 or £50k it shouldn't matter.

Just earn what you can earn, make financial decisions based on your life and goals, and pay what owe. Life's too short to be worried about paying 40% tax on £750.

But then as someone with lots of family and friends who work in the NHS I can barely see the fence in terms of paying taxes. Imo you simply can't avoid tax in one breath and then complain about anything that's publicly funded in the next (not saying you do/are.... but lots do!).
I hear what you are saying, if I was way over the 40% bracket; I would take the hit but I'm just over after my salary sacrifice penison contribution. My penison pots ain't the best, sometimes I do worry if they will ever be enough to support me later on in life, so I would rather just put the extra into that and collect it at a later date at 20% tax rate than let it sit there in an account after it's been taxed at 40%.
 
Is the interest on ISAs counted as income though?
No it's not considered as a taxable income so you don't have to declare it.



Hence why they are so much lower than savings accounts at the moment or they lock your cash away for a fixed term.
 
No it's not considered as a taxable income so you don't have to declare it.
Just challenging as I get myself into a word salad on this. Do you consider this to be correct?

A - regular savings account
B - ISA.

A. Taxable income is £100k. I am allowed £500 interest free on savings. But I must declare the £500 as income, hence taxable income becomes £100,500. I lose personal allowance of £250 i.e. a tax bill of £100 (and if I claim childcare, my £2k tax free top-up but that's by the by....)

B. Taxable income is £100k. I use an ISA. I make £500 in the ISA in interest. You are suggesting I don't add this £500 to my income, and my personal allowance isn't affected.
 
ISA wrappers are not affected, it's only incomes that are normally taxable. For me it's my interest from savings account, capital gains and interest from my two (one personal and one with work) trading accounts.


I hear what you are saying, if I was way over the 40% bracket; I would take the hit but I'm just over after my salary sacrifice penison contribution. My penison pots ain't the best, sometimes I do worry if they will ever be enough to support me later on in life, so I would rather just put the extra into that and collect it at a later date at 20% tax rate than let it sit there in an account after it's been taxed at 40%.

You and me both.
I'm going to need equity release for sure
 
Isa income is wrapped. Its not included, once you get a large ISA it is very beneficial, it's tax free income.

Yeah you can basically ignore whatever you earn from your isa. Even if you withdraw it?

So even if you withdrew 100k from an isa it would be tax free even if you put 20k in, it 5* in a year and you took it out.
 
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Just challenging as I get myself into a word salad on this. Do you consider this to be correct?

A - regular savings account
B - ISA.

A. Taxable income is £100k. I am allowed £500 interest free on savings. But I must declare the £500 as income, hence taxable income becomes £100,500. I lose personal allowance of £250 i.e. a tax bill of £100 (and if I claim childcare, my £2k tax free top-up but that's by the by....)

B. Taxable income is £100k. I use an ISA. I make £500 in the ISA in interest. You are suggesting I don't add this £500 to my income, and my personal allowance isn't affected.
I'm not a tax accountant, I didn't know this until my neice who is a tax accountant sprung it on me.. and I confirmed it with her hubby who is a business tax accountant..
So they ain't getting anything for christmas this year, but their new born daughter is getting something.. lol

I believe what you are saying is correct, in the situ of A, I believe you don't need to declare it, they will know and adjust your tax code and benefits for next year.

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Personally, I just doubled salary sacrifice penison contribution from Jan to the next tax year which has given me the head room allowance for;
my normal savings account interest,
my captial gains from selling stocks that I've been swing trading,
stocks and shares dividends,
and interest from cash held in my stocks and shares accounts.

I will need to re-do the maths again in March, as my payraise (if any) will kick in and any bonus that I'm getting this year will be placed straight into my penison.
I think I will open a SIPP account next year too, as my SIPs and SAYE schemes will start to mature, so the capital from those will be transfered into the SIPP
 
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