Shares ISA - help :) !

mallymoo72

Hi

I am a relative novice when it comes to ISA's.

I have a certain amount of shares that were given to me to me for a company I worked for when I was living in India. (I had these shares on par so face value is less twas less than £300 at the time)This is an india registered company(dont know if this makes any difference).

Now the company may possibly sell this year possibly before April 2011 The payout from the shares are set to be large(£200-300,000) so would like to be as tax efficient as I can.

I have just read that I may be able to put these shares into a share ISA and avoid capital gains once the company is sold and I am paid out. Does anyone know if this is do-able and true?

Desperately need some advice on this, the money is really important to my young family and possibly the largest lump sum we will see so want to protect it as much as I can

best wishes and thanks for reading

mallymoo

p00hsticks

Unfortunately, I don't think you're going to be able to do that - the general rule is that you have to put cash into a stocks and shares ISA wrapper, and then buy the shares within it. So you would have to sell the shares (thereby crystallising your gain) and then put the money into the S&S ISA - up to the limit of £10,200 for the year.

The only exception I'm aware of to this rule (but I'm no expert) is if the shares are in the company you work for and are obtained as part of a Save as You Earn scheme that is recognised by HMRC, which doesn't sound as if it applies here.

Finally, only shares that are traded on a recognised Stock Exchange can be held in an ISA - and the sort of gains you are talking about suggests that this is not the case here.....

blueberrypie

You can do what's known as "bed and ISA", but it does involve selling the shares, putting the proceeds into a S&S ISA, then re-buying the shares. There's some information at http://www.iii.co.uk/isas/?type=bed-and-isa - iii isn't the only provider who can do it for you, of course, but at least that will tell you what you need to be doing.

Just_landed

One other point not all shares can be put into a stocks & shares ISA.

:sad:

Martinslovechild

Bear in mind that if you have £200-300,000 worth of shares, then currently only £10,200 per annum may be invested in a Stocks & Shares ISA (increasing to £10,680 in 2011/12 tax year).

Therefore, you'll need to look for another home for the other £280,000.

As Just Landed correctly says, not all shares can be put into an ISA. Shares which are listed on the FTSE are generally fine, but AIM shares are not (unless they have a dual listing on the FTSE).