In 1996 you could have purchased an Aston Martin DB4 Zagato, of which only 19 were made, for £500,000. To put this into perspective, the same sort of money would have bought you a decent sized flat or a small house in Chelsea. Two decades later your Chelsea property would have been worth around £2.5m. Meanwhile the FTSE 100 Index…
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Trusts for Minors: Why and When?
Have trusts had their day? They are certainly looked at askance by HMRC, who sponsored a devastating attack on the creation of trusts in the 2006 Budget. However, that may be an indication that the rest of us might be missing something by not considering their advantages! This month we’d like to focus specifically on the idea of trusts for…
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Boats, planes and villas – tax efficient options
6.6.18 Checked – All info is still relevant to current regulations. If you’re one of those people who live to work and make money, and spend 100% of your time on business, you probably don’t need to read any further. If, on the other hand, you make money so as to enjoy life, you may be interested in ways to…
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Dividend reform: how to be a winner not a loser
One of the challenges facing tax authorities around the world is how to tax individuals on dividends paid by companies, given that those companies generally pay tax on profits before any such distribution is made. The approach in the US, for example, where corporation tax rates are higher than those in the UK, is to charge an additional 15% withholding…
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Alternative investor: woodland
“There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland scenery,” said Washington Irving, “that enters into the soul and delights and elevates it, and fills it with noble inclinations.” For British investors, part of that serene and settled majesty has to be the amazing tax breaks on offer. The tax tail should never, of course, wag the investment dog. Nevertheless,…
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Alternative investor: antique rings
I have just been sent Cycles of Life: Rings from Benjamin Zucker Family collection. It is part book, part catalogue and produced by Les Enluminures, one of the world’s foremost dealers in medieval manuscripts and jewellery. I have written before about my personal passion for ancient and especially medieval jewellery and I won’t bore you by going over old ground….
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The benefits of masterful inaction by Jonathan Self
How is Brexit going to affect your personal finances? Immediately after the vote to leave the pound, stock market, bonds and pension values all fell. Economists spoke of the country sliding or plunging into recession, interest rates rising or falling and tax increasing or decreasing. Political analysts announced we would be out of the EU within two years, others said…
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Opportunity: Communal living spaces
Communal or co-living, whereby tenants accept smaller living/sleeping areas in exchange for much larger communal spaces and an emphasis on social interaction, is, possibly, the fastest growing area of property investment. The reason why it is expanding so quickly is because it offers a solution to the shortage of affordable housing for young people in the world’s major cities. Another…
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Spread Betting
Huge profits of 100%, 200%, 300% or more in a matter of days. Minimal capital investment. No tax to pay on gains. The benefits of spread betting are trumpeted far and wide by the companies offering to take your money. What they play down, of course, is the risk. And yet, if you approach this opportunity as a gamble and…
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Equity or property?
Although our editorial policy might be considered contrarian, in so far as we prefer alternative to conventional investment, we never lose sight of the relative returns offered by each. In particular, the stock market has always provided better long term returns than property. Below we explain by how much and in what circumstances. Barclays recently published an Equity Gilt Study…
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