3 top tips to survive a bear market

The current coronavirus pandemic has wiped billions off global stock markets. In the world of investing, such markets where share prices experience prolonged price declines are known as bear markets. A bear market describes a situation in which stock markets fall 20% or more from recent highs amid widespread pessimism…

Government support for businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic

On 17th March the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, announced a dramatic set of temporary measures designed to support people and businesses through the COVID-19 pandemic. As greater restrictions on personal movement are brought in, they aim to help those most effected by it through the forthcoming months. How successful they are…

Coronavirus – and mortgage payment holidays

What is a mortgage payment holiday? A mortgage payment holiday is a short-term arrangement where your mortgage lender allows you to make no monthly mortgage repayments (or to make reduced payments) for an agreed period. Instead these payments are added on to your mortgage balance. If you are adversely affected…

Coronavirus – and the markets’ volatility

With billions being wiped off the stock market due to the coronavirus pandemic, it’s hard for investors not to panic. Markets are exceptionally volatile, despite measures taken by central banks around the world, including the Bank of England, to try and reduce the impact of the outbreak. There are, however,…

Budget 2020 Overview

Introduction So was it the Coronavirus Budget, or the Infrastructure Budget? Or was it, as the Chancellor declared at the end of his speech, the ‘people’s Budget from a people’s government?’ It was certainly a Budget that was high on spending commitments and one that the Chancellor declared would ‘get…

Why timing the market doesn’t work

Market timing is an investing tactic where investors transfer their money in and out of the market in an attempt to avoid losses before they occur and buy-in at the bottom after the market has fallen. It’s the well known strategy of ‘buy low and sell high’. It all sounds…

Uplift in the housing market

Positive news for property owners looking to sell; The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has reported that sales expectations have ‘’risen sharply’’ according to a survey of property professionals. House sales increased in December for the first time in seven months, boosted largely by elevated activity in the South…

What’s happening to the tapered annual allowance?

There has been much talk in the financial press recently of proposed changes to the tapered annual allowance. The taper was introduced in 2016 and gradually reduces the annual allowance for high earners. For every £2 of adjusted income above £150,000 a year, £1 of annual allowance is lost. It…

The link between human behaviour and investing

Financial planning… Isn’t that based on cold, hard facts and scientific reasoning? Surely emotions and feelings don’t have much to do with investing? I think they do. And here’s why. A little thing called human behaviour gets involved, you see. Only it’s not so little. Human beings are highly complex…
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