Selling my investments and keeping them as cash

FDa65rdk

Hello

I have shares with Hargreaves Lansdown.

Is it possible to sell all of my shares, keep the cash in my HL account then use the funds to re-invest at a later date, even a MUCH later date if I chose?

Thanks

AnotherJoe

Yes it is. Indeed its standard. Do you not already also have some cash in that account?
So, you'd just have a different amount in it after selling.
Its a bit concerning that someone with your level of knowledge doesn't realise this though, how did you acquire these shares in the first place, presumably not with cash that was in the account waiting to buy something??
Are they in an ISA or a SIPP or a general trading account?

londoninvestor

I'm second guessing here, but perhaps the OP is thinking of the old ISA rules where you weren't supposed to use an S&S ISA to hold cash for a significant amount of time. To my knowledge, these were never really enforced (and HMRC never really defined what "significant" meant).

Anyway those rules no longer apply. Originally the allowance for S&S ISAs was larger than for cash ISAs, so this was intended to stop you subverting that and using an S&S ISA allowance for cash.

That's no longer relevant now that the ISA allowance can be allocated between S&S and cash as you wish.

FDa65rdk

Thanks for your answers.

Yes, I do have cash in the account.

I just wanted to know whether it is theoretically possible to sell your entire portfolio (whether it's £1000 or £1000000) and then leave the cash untouched in the account for an indefinite period of time (whether it's 5 weeks or 5 years) until a decision is made on when and how to revisit it.

AnotherJoe

FDa65rdk wrote: »

Thanks for your answers.

Yes, I do have cash in the account.

I just wanted to know whether it is theoretically possible to sell your entire portfolio (whether it's £1000 or £1000000) and then leave the cash untouched in the account for an indefinite period of time (whether it's 5 weeks or 5 years) until a decision is made on when and how to revisit it.

Yes, not just theoretically but actually. Though 5 years in cash would be not a good use of that money in general because you'll effectively lose around a couple of % a year to inflation. But you can leave it there as long as you want and with HL there's no charge for holding that cash.

soulsaver

I'm intrigued as to the rationale for keeping it with HL.
Are you thinking of going to cash to wait out stock market headwinds/risks?

AnotherJoe

soulsaver wrote: »

I'm intrigued as to the rationale for keeping it with HL.
Are you thinking of going to cash to wait out stock market headwinds/risks?

HL is probably the best pace to keep cash in a SIPP as there's no charge. Can't recall offhand the charges for ISAs and general trading accounts that only have cash.

soulsaver

AnotherJoe wrote: »

HL is probably the best pace to keep cash in a SIPP as there's no charge. Can't recall offhand the charges for ISAs and general trading accounts that only have cash.

S/he didn't say it's a SIPP - so, I meant as opposed to high interest current accounts, P2P etc.

FDa65rdk

soulsaver wrote: »

I'm intrigued as to the rationale for keeping it with HL.
Are you thinking of going to cash to wait out stock market headwinds/risks?

Yes, it's something I'm considering. I've thought for a while that a slump in the market is coming and things I've heard over the last few days have spooked me a bit.

soulsaver

Could form the basis of an interesting discussion, maybe start a thread?

FDa65rdk

There has been talk of a crash as severe as the one in 2008, except that this time there are fewer options for dealing with it (interest rate cuts, QE etc)