HL - Share Purchases S&S ISA

LobsterMemory

I'm the first (only?) person to say stuff funds, shares are fine but when it comes to a single company, that's beyond my risk profile even with such a large company as Shell.

I mean even before you can finish saying "Well, what can go wrong?", you remember what happened to BP

And I think there was a chap on Motley Fool who put all his investments and dividends in Royal Bank of Scotland. Very happy with his strategy he was. Until he wasn't.

GooeyBlob

Nothing wrong with buying shares in individual companies so long as you buy them in lots of companies across different sectors. That way you aren't putting all your eggs in one basket. I was affected when Carillion collapsed but because it only comprised a small part of my portfolio my loss was covered elsewhere. If my entire portfolio consisted of CLLN shares I'd have lost the lot.

Shell - RDSB - has been one of my top performing shares, but then I bought them a few years ago when oil was $20 per barrel and the share price was at a low point in the cycle. For now the quarterly dividends are great but I'll have to sell the shares before too long.

[Deleted User]

You can consider using one of SPDR S&P Dividend Aristocrats ETFs, which specialises in high yield stocks divided by desired world region, ETF passively chooses only the best yield earners, with number of rules, like never missed a single dividend, never missed dividend increase year by year, etc.

They currently provide:
SPDR S&P Global Dividend Aristocrats UCITS ETF
SPDR S&P U.S. Aristocrats UCITS ETF
SPDR S&P Euro Aristocrats UCITS ETF
SPDR S&P UK Aristocrats UCITS ETF
SPDR S&P Pan Asia Aristocrats UCITS ETF
SPDR S&P Emerging Markets Aristocrats UCITS ETF

They are quite good yield earners, have a look. I used to hold the UK version, 0.30% OCF, I was happy with it. This approach could be much safer solution than holding one single stock.