Comments on: Bolton’s China trust is worth a small punt

By: Greg

Greg — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 13:19:49 +0000

Some interesting points made here, I currently hold a Barclays Stockbroker accout and am very tempted to invest £500. What are the likely cost of withdrawing money and is there a minimum term.?

By: The Investor

The Investor — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:49:24 +0000

Thanks Kate, have now heard this from two sources (including you). Still avoiding though now, due to the performance fees that have come out since writing the article.

Good luck if you go in!

By: Kate

Kate — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:42:44 +0000

Just wanted to raise a point. You can invest in this fund (in IPO period) with Barclays Stockbrokers and the minimum investment is £500. You can hold in ISA, MM or SIPP…

By: The Investor

The Investor — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 13:29:09 +0000

Interesting info JT, I’ll go have a snoop around their site when I get a minute!

By: JT

JT — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:14:18 +0000

There’s an ad for this trust on Barclays stockbrokers and the subscription level is £500. Think that may only apply for barclays account holders.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 20:17:06 +0000

Probably won’t be risking more than the min. Have also bought other funds to compare, one China, one Russia.

My fear…it is a closed investment. It is fronted by Bolton. It is therfore a marketing front to get as much cash in now. If it was an open ended investment I would go in a bit bigger and drip feed. The fact that the fund is going into small to medium caps dictates the need for the drip feed in as well. I would even have accepted an open ended fund with major penalties for exiting before Bolton retires.

But look at the opportunity… it will attract the cash… the big buying will drive share prices up for the small caps…. the flock will feel that they have been left behind and want some of the action so it will trade at a premium. Get in …. Get out and then get back in.

How long before the existing global goliaths are free to compete as they wish in China anyway???

Give me a an open ended fund that enables the fund manager to flit between and short Russia and China and I am in.

By: The Investor

The Investor — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 01:07:07 +0000

@Mickey – Useful info, thanks for stopping back and updating us. I’m by no means an expert on all brokers available, but there are definitely platforms (such as self-select ISA brokers) that will let you hold ETFs for free once you’ve bought them, paying just an annual charge (say £30-40) for the account.

From memory Selftrade for instance charges £35. (This doesn’t include any dividend reinvesting or similar, for which normal brokerage charges would apply).

I’ll keep my eyes peeled for Tim Hale’s book.

By: Mickey

Mickey — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 22:58:29 +0000

Hi,
The fund charges on the Fidelity and First State funds are higher than the likely costs of holding this Investment Trust but I offset my fund fees by using a fund supermarket, not paying an initial fee plus getting around .15 or .20% of the annual fee back. A lot of the cost comparisons mistakenly count the 5% initial fee that is easily avoided. I am currently looking at a swap to ETF’s and have just read Tim Hale’s ‘Smarter Investing’ with that in mind. The book made me more aware of a few things such as lifetime goal and costs, however I have to balance the lower cost of ETF’s against the fact that my Fund Supermarket gives me .15% back each year and would charge 0.5% on ETF’s annually (max charge £200).

I expect to move away from funds due to the total lifetime cost rather than the small difference between ETF’s + Management fee versus the TER of funds.

With regard to the Bolton China fund, I’m going to give it a miss. Having a punt on it is no better than gambling, sites such as yours are slowly educating me to the naivety of that

Thanks for a very useful website,
Mickey

By: The Investor

The Investor — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 10:18:05 +0000

Great info Old Pro, thanks for sharing! I’ve already updated the article above accordingly.

As you can see, I likely won’t invest at launch now. I may if there’s a big discount to NAV but we’ll see – I don’t expect one in a hurry.

By: OldPro

OldPro — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 10:12:31 +0000

Fidelity starting to push this hard and some nuggets are trickling out in the money biz press.

Company plans to raise $1 billion – biggest IT fund raising ever (nominal). (So equates to your £630 million Monevator, denom will be USD I s’pose)

Minimum subscription will be £2,500 shares at £1 a pop

Annual management charge 1.5%

Trail commission 0.5%

Advisers register at http://www.fidelity.co.uk/adviser or 0800-414177 with packs going out 26th Feb.

By: The Investor

The Investor — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 21:16:03 +0000

@Sam, I think this is similar to the discussions we’ve had in the past about invention and industry. Remember, the States is 6x bigger and you’re the equivalent of the Roman Empire at the moment. You *should* be dominant. There’s also the fact that similar to how British companies sell up too soon to ever make it really big, so British investors and businessmen generally don’t get as meglomaniac as Americans. Once you have your ‘nut’ – your ten million, for your country house and the rest, you can retire to moaning about how Britain isn’t as great as it was in the old days.

I’m touched by your concern for our wet and windy rock though.

By: Financial Samurai

Financial Samurai — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 20:37:20 +0000

Why is it that there seems to be a lack of famous English investors or business men? I can only think of Richard Branson.... hmmm. You guys had like a century++ head start over Americans. What happened? Just curious. .-= Financial Samurai on: Getting Busy This Valentine’s Weekend! (Singles Especially) =-.