Is the UK heading for a recession? It’s too early to call – but this is how investors can potentially avoid missteps February 18, 2016 The troubled performance of credit and equity markets in the last six months suggests the chance of an imminent UK recession has risen. We’re not calling it yet but it pays to know what happened in the last financial crisis to avoid missteps. We studied the FTSE 350 earnings-per-share and stock price trends seen during [...]
The robotics revolution: Why investment in robots is booming February 18, 2016 Robots are continuing their long march towards world domination. Their ultimate supremacy over humans is predicted to be reached in 2035, the point in time when robots will begin to develop at a faster rate than us mere humans can comprehend. But right now, robots have reached a point of intelligence where they will soon [...]
Bias and behaviour: Vestra Wealth’s David Scott on investing in uncertainty February 18, 2016 What do we mean by “risk”? For some, it is the absence of certainty. Others associate it with danger. Whatever your view, it is an inevitable part of investing. Since the start of the year, investors have been dumping equities, and to some extent the rout has been self-perpetuating. As share values fall, we tend [...]
Stamp of approval: Has the Chinese economic slowdown licked the value of philatelic investments? February 18, 2016 When share prices are volatile, fine wine, art and other tangible assets offer the bittersweet assurance that your investment will only turn to dust if exposed to excessive sunlight or extremes in temperature. Interest in philatelic investment, or stamp collecting, peaked after the financial crisis as investors turned to alternative asset classes to diversify their [...]
Investing in India: Reform wobbles have not jeopardised the country’s rise and rise February 18, 2016 For all the bombast, it is possible to see the still relatively new premiership of Indian leader Narendra Modi as a disappointment. Despite the Prime Minister’s overwhelming General Election victory in 2014, his promises of business-friendly reforms have remained largely unfulfilled. Crucially, the passing of an all-embracing VAT, known as the Goods and Services Tax [...]
Osborne’s pensions tax relief shake-up explained: What could happen and what should you do about it? February 18, 2016 Former pensions minister Steve Webb made headlines earlier in the month by claiming that abolishing Britain’s current system of pension tax relief could be George Osborne’s “’Gordon Brown’ moment” (referring to the latter’s notorious tax raid on occupational pensions in 1997). Now a director at Royal London, Webb pulled few punches in outlining what he [...]
Osborne’s latest pensions raid: Flat rate tax relief would be both irrational and unfair February 18, 2016 Private pensions have always been a soft target for cash-hungry chancellors. Nigel Lawson made pension funds restrict the size of their surpluses under threat of losing their tax-exempt status. Gordon Brown abolished Advance Corporation Tax in the great pension raid of 1997. And George Osborne has done his bit by slashing the annual and lifetime [...]
Alternative finance in 2016: Why the latest industry report tells us it’s now too big to ignore February 18, 2016 The growth of the alternative finance market is slowing. In 2015, it grew by 84 per cent compared to the 2013-14 rate of 161 per cent. This is the headline finding from Pushing Boundaries, the annual alternative finance report from Judge Business School’s Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF) and Nesta, which was released yesterday. But [...]
Ladies who don’t lunch: Maike Currie talks to financial services entrepreneur Joanne Smith about dry January and why compliance is the “new rock ‘n roll” February 18, 2016 My lunch date with Joanne Smith, financial services veteran turned entrepreneur, is long overdue. I have been using stalling tactics and to be honest it’s due to her area of expertise: compliance. (Read: boring box-ticker.) But it’s a New Year and, cloaked in noble resolutions, I finally make the time to meet her at a [...]
Saving Britain’s charities: The role of the finance function February 18, 2016 It is something of an understatement to say that it hasn’t been a great few months for the charity sector. Public patience with so-called “chuggers” who look to solicit donations from passers-by on the street has long been wearing thin. As an isolated practice, it seemed the public were just about able to bear it given [...]