What a Loss

fugglestick

4 years ago I placed my SIPP with James Hay and Brookes MacDonald. Some £68K

Today I drew it out at £45K. Clearly gutted I want to manage what there is left myself before they lose the lot. Seem BM, were ok keep taking their management fees etc.......Its only me that lost...

Does anyone have any investment ideas please?
Other than gold sovereigns and Krugerrands..

Thanks all

kidmugsy

fugglestick wrote: »

4 years ago I placed my SIPP with James Hay and Brookes MacDonald.

Are those quoted companies? Buy their shares?

dunstonh

Today I drew it out at £45K. Clearly gutted I want to manage what there is left myself before they lose the lot. Seem BM, were ok keep taking their management fees etc.......Its only me that lost...

It isnt BM's fault that you lost. It is your choices that led to the loss.

Does anyone have any investment ideas please?
Other than gold sovereigns and Krugerrands..

Havent you done enough damage already with what you had? So, why look at other non-mainstream stuff?

Have you considered what most people do and stick to mainstream options?

fugglestick

What mainstream options.........I paid good commission to so called experts to invest and give me a modest return on my money. Frankly a chimpanzee with a pin would have done no worse....

dunstonh

I paid good commission to so called experts to invest and give me a modest return on my money.

Commission hasnt been around for almost 4 years. About the time you said you invested. At least not with regulated mainstream things.

Virtually nothing regulated has lost money in the last 4 years. So, what is it that you have?

atush

What exactly did you/they invest your money in?

Conventional options would include global trackers and mixed asset funds.

Sounds like you went risky or unregulated.

Alice_Holt

fugglestick wrote: »

Today I drew it out at £45K.

Cashed in or transfered to another provider?

If you "drew it out" is the £45k after tax charges?

fugglestick

I invested in a SIPP, where the investment profile was Medium to low, not wanting to chance risky shares and with authority to invest as they felt appropriate to obtain that return. Their commission, as some are a little pedantic here, was not commission per se annual but annual management fees, deducted whether the portfolio lost money or not....
The investment was over a whole raft of companies, dozens in fact which I cannot list here. Suffice to say every year, the return on the whole investment portfolio, sometimes never covered their management fees, and sometime lost considerably more than that completely. They still had their fees mind you. Reward for non performance...
Mt moan, is as an engineer, you want something made, its done to the best of my ability to give long service and reliability. It fails, then no cost to you. As far as this whole episode is concerned the facts are:
I paid an FA for advice...waste of money,and he wasnt cheap.... I paid an investment company every year to make me a modest return or at least break even. waste of time and money and my whole opinion is that the financial institution failed to give me a return, but did however score their own fees.
It just really convinces me that my original opinion of the financial institutions was right......
And so back to the draining of the swamp, are there any suggestions to areas where I can invest for modest returns, other than gold and metals investment.
The irony is, whilst I was paying them fees, the Sovereigns I bought years go myself have made a far better return than the above!!! So I am tempted to re invest in gold.

jamesd

fugglestick wrote: »

Some £68K... Today I drew it out at £45K.

By drew it out do you mean took it out of the SIPP entirely, paying tax on 75% of it the way out? That would explain a good deal of the loss.

If so besides the tax cost you now have a £10k per year limit for pension contributions into money purchase pensions in hour name.

I have difficulty in believing that Brooks MacDonald really did invest the money according to the risk scale you have outlined. The results seem too poor given that a lot of it would need to have been placed in corporate and government bonds or funds holding them to achieve that sort of risk level. This is an area worth exploring because complaints of this nature have led to all losses being repaid if the investments were found to exceed the specified risk level. Often only after a rejected complaint and Financial Ombudsman Service decision.

fugglestick

I dont pay pensions contributions being age 67, but luckily have other independent financial income, but trust me, the returns from BM were pretty rubbish. Every year when I got the portfolio results I groaned, so thought I cant do any worse than lose it myself....draw it out before I lose even more. I know it took I big hit from the Asian/Far East investments they made.
Thanks for the advice, appreciated and I will check it out.

bigadaj

fugglestick wrote: »

I dont pay pensions contributions being age 67, but luckily have other independent financial income, but trust me, the returns from BM were pretty rubbish. Every year when I got the portfolio results I groaned, so thought I cant do any worse than lose it myself....draw it out before I lose even more. I know it took I big hit from the Asian/Far East investments they made.
Thanks for the advice, appreciated and I will check it out.

Dig out your statements and copy the stated investments here, that's the only way anyone can sensibly comment.

An average investment return over the last four years, though heavily dependent on the exact sectors you were in, would probably have increased by around 25% for lower risk investments so something is wrong.