HYP- High Yield Portfolio

$17mma

A colleague has asked me (known MSE in the department) how he can go about purchasing shares from various companies, are their any sites etc that he can use to do this?

Mikeyorks

There's an article here :-

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/viewnews.cgi?newsid1117533386,21726,

..... or a list here (also the MORE button bottom right) :-

http://www.find.co.uk/investment/online_share_dealing/

MORPH3US

If you get the company to "hold" the shares, what does that mean?!?!

M

Mikeyorks

By 'company' I assume you mean 'broker'? Most share transactions are now in electronic format and the shares are held in your account / portfolio by your broker. And you should be able to view the account online and see how (badly - at the moment ) they are faring.

If you have some existing shares on paper - you can normally convert these to electronic format and add them to your account. Makes subsequent dealing easier / cheaper.

cheerfulcat

A colleague has asked me (known MSE in the department) how he can go about purchasing shares from various companies, are their any sites etc that he can use to do this?

Send him to TMF for investment info. If he is looking for a broker, it depends a lot on what he wants to do but for general investing purposes Squaregain is hard to beat.

plumb1_2

cheerfulcat wrote:

Send him to TMF for investment info. If he is looking for a broker, it depends a lot on what he wants to do but for general investing purposes Squaregain is hard to beat.

More on the squaregain offer here http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=91587

$17mma

OK after reading up about this share thing and my colleague giving me the spiel I have been on the MFool and have been reading up on this HYP thing and it looks really interesting and I understand the concept of using shares to create a long term hopefuly sustainable income through dividends rather than selling and buying etc etc..But how do you decide which shares to buy? Ok The Fool states that companies that are not affected by change as much as others such as utilities, BT etc and that have a history of increased their dividends over time. However for someone like me who has never looked at the FTSE 100 let alone decide which shares are good to buy and which arent seems impossible.. Not only that which broker do you use? the name broker to me sounds as untrustowrthy as an insurance salesman!Dont know if anyone else culd make sense of it but i cant...

cheerfulcat

But how do you decide which shares to buy? Ok The Fool states that companies that are not affected by change as much as others such as utilities, BT etc and that have a history of increased their dividends over time. However for someone like me who has never looked at the FTSE 100 let alone decide which shares are good to buy and which arent seems impossible

All about the HYP, including how to pick shares here. The MF HYP discussion board is here.

Not only that which broker do you use? the name broker to me sounds as untrustowrthy as an insurance salesman!

Perhaps you are thinking of discretionary brokers, who manage your portfolio? An execution-only broker like Squaregain is perfectly OK, no worries about trustworthiness as you are making the investment decisions.

$17mma

cheerfulcat wrote:

All about the HYP, including how to pick shares here. The MF HYP discussion board is here.


Perhaps you are thinking of discretionary brokers, who manage your portfolio? An execution-only broker like Squaregain is perfectly OK, no worries about trustworthiness as you are making the investment decisions.

Hello Cheerful cat As mentioned have been on the "Fool" and have been reading the articles for best part of a week! still cant make sense of where to begin, the historic info relating to companies goes on forever and I have fried my brain in tryin to figure out which are the best ones to buy, also do brokers charge if so how much? is this dependant on how many shares you buy?

cheerfulcat

Hi, $17mma,

Did you look at the HYP discussion board? There's always someone starting a new HYP and getting advice. The companies don't change that much; if you look at FF50's post here you'll see a lot of the current HYP picks. You can also use a stock screener like this one at Digitallook to find shares that fit your criteria.

Edit: Here are the HY selection rules; basically, large cap, low gearing, history of increasing dividends and sector diversification.

Brokers charge for buying and selling; anything from a flat £1.50 with Halifax ( but little control over when the shares are bought ) to 1% - 1.65% of the trade with the more expensive brokers. Squaregain charge £12.50 per trade. There is also tax to pay when buying - another 0.5%.

$17mma

cheerfulcat wrote:

Hi, $17mma,

Did you look at the HYP discussion board? There's always someone starting a new HYP and getting advice. The companies don't change that much; if you look at FF50's post here you'll see a lot of the current HYP picks. You can also use a stock screener like this one at Digitallook to find shares that fit your criteria.

Thanks for that ( will click your button later cant do it from work)Have looked at the companies listed I take it these are the top ones? Royal Dutch Shell PLCLloyds TSB Group PLCBT Group PLCUnilever PLCLegal & General Group PLCPearson PLCUnited Utilities PLCGallaher Group PLCAlliance & Leicester PLCCompass Group PLCScottish & Newcastle PLCDSG International PLCRentokil Initial PLCTate & Lyle PLCWilliam Hill PLCF&C Asset Management PLCSmith(DS) PLC though I do not see RBS here?...also thought Stephen Bland advised no more than 15 and is there a certain amount you should invest in each one to begin with?