Every week I read a large number of personal finance and investing articles. Here’s my latest weekly shortcut to the best.
The new UK tax year is nearly two weeks old, and even if this recent bank-led rally [1] is due to run out of steam, it’s time for UK investors to start thinking about their 2009/10 ISA allocation.
I’ve written before about why you shouldn’t delay in opening your stocks and shares ISA [2]. I’ll probably get the £7,200 required to fund mine by selling shares held outside my existing ISA wrappers.
I’ll also be watching the upcoming budget for changes to the ISA regime. We can’t rule anything out – the UK government is desperate for cash, and taxes will need to rise!
Good reads from the financial blogosphere
- Oblivious Investor explains how lucky mutual funds can look skilled [3].
- The Psy-Fi blog discusses how mutual funds keep hanging on [4], despite posting inferior returns to trackers.
- Living off Dividends has reprinted Taleb’s 10 principles for a Black Swan-free world [5]. Worth reading, though surely a contradiction in terms!
- If you want to hire a financial planner, make sure you read Get Rich Slowly’s eight tips [6] first.
- Amateur Asset Allocator wants us to keep the recession in perspective [7]. Wise words, from an author was actually laid off a few months ago.
- Ditching your job for a start-up is risky, but I love side projects and passive income. Live Learn Invest has a fantastic little post about finding suppliers for your niche store [8].
- In debt? MoneyNing has 25 tips to getting out of debt [9].
- Money Watch reports that UK online bank Egg is to stop paying interest on positive credit card balances [10]. Egg cards are worth watching, because they were for a long time a key plank of attempts to make money from interest free credit cards, a method known as stoozing [11].
Generally UK-related articles from other websites and papers
- The Independent doesn’t fancy investing in Thailand [12] with the unrest going on.
- Instead, columnist Ben Yearsley is suggesting you look at infrastructure funds for income [13]. Spookily, the FT writes the same thing [14]. I sense fund marketing and PR at work!
- Adam Shaw, who used to appear on Working Lunch, has been investigating the collapse in pension funds for Panorama, as he writes in the FT [15].
- First-time buyers with wealthy parents [16] make up 40% of new applicants at estate agents in London, says the FT. The rest are still screwed.
- The Telegraph says copper may be a better bet than gold [17]. Worth thinking about… I almost invested in a raw metals ETF when prices plunged earlier this year.
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