How to move money from cash ISA into the stock market

badger09

RyanHello said:

Sorry I did mean to say only one Stocks and Share ISA can be opened a year. I was just comparing Vanguard to HSBC.
With a stocks and share ISA you can invest up to £20000 a year tax free. There's a lot of ready made cautious portfolios to invest in. 

Not correct. There is no restriction on the number of S&S ISAs (or other types of ISA) which can be opened each year. The restriction applies to paying new money into only one ISA (of each type).

FinancialIdiot

Anybody care suggest a suitable number of funds to hold in my ISA and amount to put into each, given I'm a novice investor interested only in beginner-type funds like VLS and investing c. £30k? That might at least help guide my decision about specific funds to choose and how to divide the money. Or does it make little real difference?

masonic

FinancialIdiot said:

Anybody care suggest a suitable number of funds to hold in my ISA and amount to put into each, given I'm a novice investor interested only in beginner-type funds like VLS and investing c. £30k? That might at least help guide my decision about specific funds to choose and how to divide the money. Or does it make little real difference?

How about 1 multi-asset fund? Keep things simple.

potatobrains

I'm a novice too. I've ended up with Vanguard with three of their products: LS20 + LS60 + S&P500, and treating them as short, medium & long term pots. If I need some money I can take some out of the LS20 as it is least likely to drop significantly, the other two pots can be left alone for longer respectively & I'll try not to panic as they vary more wildly. I spent too many hours reading online articles. I think read of having more than 1 LS fund on here, which I hadn't thought of before. When I was starting out, I tried to pigeon hole myself to one of the LS products as that's what most fund providers try to do, but I prefer the idea of using  them as per the above plan. I evaluated their other funds but just got myself in a pickle & I've got a couple of other funds that I'll transfer into the above once they go green again, lol. The next thing for me to figure out is the %-balance between cash & the above; I might go for 50% cash, 25% (LS20 & LS60), 25% S&P500.

Edit: the S&P 500 is basically on the back of Warren Buffet's recommendation (generally good, but I'm aware it isn't always that way).

tel_

Not wishing to hijack this OP, but what's been mentioned has some correlation to my dilemma.

I invest monthly into just one fund - Vanguard LS 80 - using Vanguard's own platform. I am content with continuing to use this fund for deposits, but as time passes and I amass a larger sum into it, I can't help pondering the thought that it might be worthwhile contributing to another fund with less UK bias, (as this is often commented on the MSE forums), so my contributions are spread more evenly.

Using non-Vanguard funds would be ideal, but as I'm using Vanguard's platform, and contributing new money into this years ISA allowance, I can't open another ISA.

How about Van's FTSE Global All Cap Index Fund? 

Same risk rating (5) and same-ish ongoing charge (0.23%).

Heavy North American weighting though - 60.1%, but UK is just 4.2%.

Any thoughts or recommendations?

potatobrains

 Through my calculations & online chart comparing I think the cheaper FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. Equity Index Fund - Accumulation (OCF=0.14%), performs better than the FTSE Global All Cap Index Fund - Accumulation (OCF=0.23%). The former performs about the same as the S&P 500 (OCF=0.07%).

masonic

Agree, the ex-UK fund is also a better way to correct for too much UK in the main fund.

grumiofoundation

potatobrains said:

 Through my calculations & online chart comparing I think the cheaper FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. Equity Index Fund - Accumulation (OCF=0.14%), performs better than the FTSE Global All Cap Index Fund - Accumulation (OCF=0.23%). The former performs about the same as the S&P 500 (OCF=0.07%).

The 2 aren't tracking exactly the same indexes. 

FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. Equity Index Fund -  large and mid-sized company shares in developed markets, 

FTSE Global All Cap Index Fund - large, mid-sized and small company shares in developed and emerging markets

potatobrains

Hah, I wish I was! Well, the rich bit anyway!

Is the FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. one better for a UK resident than the S&P500 then? I'd be holding it alongside the LS funds already mentioned.

bowlhead99

potatobrains said:

Is the FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. one better for a UK resident than the S&P500 then? I'd be holding it alongside the LS funds already mentioned.

The S&P500 tracker puts your money into the biggest companies that happen to be listed on the US stock markets. 

The Developed World Ex-UK tracker puts your money into the biggest companies that are listed on the stock markets of 20+ countries, including the US.

If you know that the US stock market will perform better than all the other countries, then sure, use the US tracker rather than the developed world tracker.

I would suggest that you don't know that, so why gamble on it?