Difficulty Getting Advice on Investment Trusts

dunstonh

Research companies want to be given everything on a plate before going off for a three martini lunch IME.

The way the FSA dishes out fines for little things (and ignores the big stuff from the big boys) can you blame them?

Plus consumers complain about everything nowadays.

Totton

I have sympathy for dunstonh's view. In some cases an OEIC from the same manager will be a better investment where the IT is on a premium or the iT takes more risk with gearing for example.

Personally I much prefer IT's to funds and only hold one OEIC at the moment, everything else is an IT, my smaller co's choice is Throgmorton which still sits on a healthy discount though I may dispose of it at my next quarterly review as it just scraped through this time :-)

For income from IT's my choices previously where City of London, Temple Bar, Troy Income & Growth, Edinburgh and Dunedin Income & Growth. Of those my only holding at the moment is Troy Income & Growth, City of London, Temple Bar and Edinburgh all went as I felt they had gotten expensive, Dunedin was not a great performer although the yield was nice and Troy I&G was kept as it was cheap considering it was obvious Troy would narrow the discount in the same way they run Personal Assets.

Anyway, rambling so time to stop :-)

All the best,
Mickey

gadgetmind

dunstonh wrote: »

The way the FSA dishes out fines for little things (and ignores the big stuff from the big boys) can you blame them?

I rarely blame anyone for anything, yet neither do I trust the views of "analysts" and "researchers" as I know first hand how shallow their understanding tends to be.

Plus consumers complain about everything nowadays.

It's hard to know quite what an IFA would regard as the perfect customer. Those with fully-functional grey matter won't have the need for investment advice, while those with a head full of rocks will be down the pub drinking their disposable income, so where does that leave you?

jamesd

Wealthy people with lots of grey matter who want to use it for work or fun, not watching finances.

gadgetmind

jamesd wrote: »

Wealthy people with lots of grey matter who want to use it for work or fun, not watching finances.

You are allowed to do all three!

phuket

Thanks for all the replies so far. One of the reasons I want to look at ITs is because of their ability to hold back profits to pay divs in tough times but it looks like I might have to settle for the usual funds instead.

gadgetmind

phuket wrote: »

One of the reasons I want to look at ITs is because of their ability to hold back profits to pay divs in tough times but it looks like I might have to settle for the usual funds instead.

Or shares or trackers or ETFs.

If you're relying on this income, and can't just tighten your belt and live off more reliable cash flow from elsewhere, then you will need a multi-year cash buffer.

TCA

Although I won't have any spare cash to invest until the turn of the year, I think I'm swaying away from too much first-time investment in ITs. I originally liked the idea of producing an income stream from them - but I wouldn't be reliant on that income (at this stage), so growth is probably more important. But I'm also not so confident that a buy-and-hold IT strategy wouldn't require too much monitoring (with my little knowledge and experience).

So now back to the thinking of a core holding of trackers (probably Vanguard Dev World ex-UK to balance my UK heavy pension) and perhaps Vanguard's Emerging Markets ETF for a bit of spice. Then the temptation will be to plough a little bit into some odd ones like Aberforth Smaller Companies Trust (or Aberdeen Asia Smaller Companies Trust or a small companies global tracker), perhaps a property fund (UK or global) and maybe some global equity like Murray International Trust.

Do I sound confused? Yes? It's because I probably am! I'll probably bottle it and stick the money away at 4% for a few years seeing as I'm a non UK tax payer.

gadgetmind

TCA wrote: »

Do I sound confused? Yes? It's because I probably am!

No, what you said sounded jolly sensible to me!