Are your savings safe? article discussion

John_Pierpoint

Santander thread here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3970405

gunmaker

Many thanks to you both. I can sleep better now.:beer:

simonhunter87

does anyone know about M&G Investments? I have a shares ISA with them so it must be UK regulated but I don't see it on any of Martin's lists :S

dunstonh

does anyone know about M&G Investments? I have a shares ISA with them so it must be UK regulated but I don't see it on any of Martin's lists :S

It is a fund house. Not a bank. You wont have savings/deposit accounts with them but have investments. So, the deposits protection scheme wont apply. The investments protection scheme applies to investments. However, it is largely irrelevant with unit linked funds when looking at solvency of the company.

SallyG

I was fine until I read the FSCS Don't Panic notice.
My Scottish Widows drawdown pension is in an OEIC - does it have any protection ? - my ISA savings are with the Halifax - ie they're joined at the hip- does that reduce the amount guaranteed?

dunstonh

My Scottish Widows drawdown pension is in an OEIC - does it have any protection ?

same answer as above.

my ISA savings are with the Halifax - ie they're joined at the hip- does that reduce the amount guaranteed?

savings are deposits not investments and are protected under the deposit protection scheme and not the investments protection scheme. They dont overlap with each other as they are two different things.

77foster

advice on this please
at santander today whilst discussing a soon to be matured bond I discovered, to my naive horror, that £40,000 of our savings is not covered by the £85,000. The explanation was way over my head something to do with investments isas and ggp or gcap or something. . confused..very

oldvicar

77foster wrote: »

advice on this please
at santander today whilst discussing a soon to be matured bond I discovered, to my naive horror, that £40,000 of our savings is not covered by the £85,000. The explanation was way over my head something to do with investments isas and ggp or gcap or something. . confused..very

I'm sorry I cannot tell from the description what this is, but the simple advice is that you don't understand what you have, and for this reason alone it is probably unsuitable for you. Go back and ask for a further explanation.

G'Meister

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned BitCoin, if you really want to keep your money safe, can't get much safer than your own private fort knox (I keep mine in the cloud backed up several times over (http://www.instantfundas.com/2012/04/put-your-dropbox-or-google-drive-folder.html) and encrypted using TrueCrypt).
I recommend https://www.blockchain.info - I think it's the best bitcoin exchange for the UK. MT Gox is the biggest exchange.

I recommend working out what questions you have, and finding answers to them, before diving in, but it's much simpler than it looks - you're basically just exchanging Euro's (or Sterling) for BitCoin, which you can then spend (or as most people do, treat as savings). Of course, as with keeping your money in a currency aside Euros, the value of BTC can rise or fall. That said, so does the value of the Euro.
I personally hold much more faith in the long-term value of BTC versus Euros or Sterling.

John_Pierpoint

oldvicar wrote: »

I'm sorry I cannot tell from the description what this is, but the simple advice is that you don't understand what you have, and for this reason alone it is probably unsuitable for you. Go back and ask for a further explanation.

Probably a packaged investment - remember when some could be in cash, some in equities or other market priced security and a small amount in an life insurance company ?

Nothing in the world can guarantee the value of the market priced investment.

If I remember correctly there was a risk valve; if you moved into the market valued part from the simple deposit part you could not retreat back again.