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Individual Savings Accounts, universally known as ISAs, began life as relatively simple savings plans in 1999, but over the past 21 years the rules surrounding them have become ever more complex. A May 2018 report on savings tax from the Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) suggested that “there is scope for a wider full review […]

With the second lockdown now in place, the Chancellor has been forced to return to Parliament and announce extended job support measures. Two further grants under the SEISS were announced in September and have now been updated. The government’s new package of support measures laid out in the Chancellor’s Winter Economy Plan have been either […]

A recent report on UK dividend payments suggests the worst of the cuts may be over. For many, 2020 has not been a year they will want to remember. For investors, the first two quarters were a whiplash experience. For about a month from mid-February, Covid-19 pushed share markets down with a brutal abruptness. By […]

New research shows the majority of the self-employed are not saving for retirement.  Here’s a quick quiz: Are you self-employed? If so, have you contributed to a private pension in the last year? The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) examined the answers to these two questions and found the probability of answering yes to both […]

The Chinese stock market broke the $10 trillion barrier in October. The total value of China’s stock markets in Shanghai and Shenzhen surpassed $10 trillion in October. For comparison, the UK market was worth about $4 trillion at the end of September 2020. However, this was not the first time that Chinese markets had reached […]

New HMRC data show the popularity of this traditional perk could be waning. There was a time when the company car was the fringe benefit that every employee wanted. You had ‘made it’ once you had the keys to a car with no worries about servicing, insuring or, sometimes, even fuel costs. It could also […]