Workplace pension: switch to a higher risk fund portfolio

Malthusian

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Anyone holding a stake in a company, whether directly or indirectly, such as Last Minute .com would have suffered a permenent loss of capital.

We are talking about a widely diversified pension fund, not an individual share. A workplace pension fund designed as a single-fund solution (which is what the Adventurous Pension Investment Approach is) would have suffered no permanent loss whatsoever if the investment was properly diversified and Lastminute.com consisted of a suitably tiny (<1%) proportion of the portfolio.

Permanent loss is when your investment goes down and never recovers no matter how much time in the market you spend. The investment being discussed here is the Scottish Widows Adventurous Pension Investment Approach, not an individual share.

The Scottish Widows Adventurous Pension Investment Approach has minimal risk of permanent loss unless the OP panics and cashes in, because it is diversified across thousands of shares and losses on the likes of Lastminute.com will be lost in the noise.

Very few if any workplace pension schemes will offer access to individual shares, because employers don't want to be held responsible for employees gambling away their pension fund playing day trader.