Stocks & Shares ISAs

manorhouse wrote: »

I read a post on this site yesterday which spoke very well of free trade.
The free trade bit i did not like as they seem to bunch all trades together at close.
But it appears you can pay just £1 for an instant trade .
No platform charge .
It is fca registered so have 85k of safe cover .
Good to have competition if we all took it up might force the likes of HL to review prices .

The emergence of a cheap and cheerful but extremely limited platform won't have HL quaking in their boots, in much the same way that a new Premier Inn across the road from the Ritz wouldn't spark consternation for the latter.

There's already plenty of competition in this market, many of whom offer similarly comprehensive ranges of investments to HL at a lower cost, for those who don't feel the need to pay HL's premium prices. Also, HL are already price-competitive for those whose investment profile benefits from HL's £45 price cap for shares, ETFs, etc.

I doubt many on here would have an HSBC S&S ISA to be able to answer that question. It might be better to just ask HSBC via secure message, etc?

Yes I get the impression that the OP has a general cash account which may not be part of the ISA wrapper but is shown alongside the S&S ISA account?

It's similar with iWeb where they require you to open a GIA even if you only want a S&S ISA.

Unless they are simply talking about the uninvested cash that is already within the S&S ISA wrapper?

I have never heard of a forum regular using an HSBC investment account so its probably best they clarify with HSBC directly.

Alex

Suzie123 wrote: »

I'm hoping for some guidance regarding Stocks and Shares ISAs as I know very little about them and am feeling a little overwhelmed having spent a lot of time researching.

[...]

But I have no idea where to start.... for example, do I choose the platform or the fund first and how do I do that? I'm not looking for financial advice, but a steer as to how to start investing.

Not sure where you've been researching thus far, but newbie investor threads on here typically highlight reading material at sites suited to inexperienced investors, such as:

https://www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk/en/articles/investing-beginners-guide
https://www.hl.co.uk/beginners-guides/investing
http://www.monevator.com
http://kroijer.com/
http://diyinvestoruk.blogspot.com/
https://www.ifa.com/indexfundsthemovie/

as well as bearing in mind a number of key points of principle:

1. Only consider investing once you have adequate accessible cash reserves.
2. Only invest if you're happy to commit for at least 5-7 years and preferably 10-15 or more.
3. Diversify - ignore individual shares, etc, and concentrate on collective investments that spread your eggs over many baskets. Global multi-asset funds are a good place to start, available from the likes of HSBC Global Strategy, Vanguard LifeStrategy, Blackrock Consensus and L&G Multi-Index.
4. Choose what you want to invest in before considering which platform to hold it/them on.
5. Keep an eye on ongoing costs for funds and platforms - they shouldn't be the primary consideration but can make a noticeable difference over the long term.
6. Use a Stocks & Shares ISA as a tax-efficient wrapper to avoid liability for income and capital gains tax.

Once you've sorted out what you want to invest in, there are various sites geared up to comparing the most cost-effective way of holding your chosen investment(s), but start with researching at the above sites first:

http://monevator.com/compare-the-brokers/
http://www.comparefundplatforms.com/
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5583030

Given your husband's apparent success with an S&S ISA, are there any particular reasons why his chosen approach wouldn't work for you? I'm not suggesting that blindly following him is appropriate or that you shouldn't do your own research though....

eskbanker wrote: »

Not sure where you've been researching thus far, but newbie investor threads on here typically highlight reading material at sites suited to inexperienced investors, such as:

https://www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk/en/articles/investing-beginners-guide
https://www.hl.co.uk/beginners-guides/investing
http://www.monevator.com
http://kroijer.com/
http://diyinvestoruk.blogspot.com/
https://www.ifa.com/indexfundsthemovie/

as well as bearing in mind a number of key points of principle:

1. Only consider investing once you have adequate accessible cash reserves.
2. Only invest if you're happy to commit for at least 5-7 years and preferably 10-15 or more.
3. Diversify - ignore individual shares, etc, and concentrate on collective investments that spread your eggs over many baskets. Global multi-asset funds are a good place to start, available from the likes of HSBC Global Strategy, Vanguard LifeStrategy, Blackrock Consensus and L&G Multi-Index.
4. Choose what you want to invest in before considering which platform to hold it/them on.
5. Keep an eye on ongoing costs for funds and platforms - they shouldn't be the primary consideration but can make a noticeable difference over the long term.
6. Use a Stocks & Shares ISA as a tax-efficient wrapper to avoid liability for income and capital gains tax.

Once you've sorted out what you want to invest in, there are various sites geared up to comparing the most cost-effective way of holding your chosen investment(s), but start with researching at the above sites first:

http://monevator.com/compare-the-brokers/
http://www.comparefundplatforms.com/
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5583030

Given your husband's apparent success with an S&S ISA, are there any particular reasons why his chosen approach wouldn't work for you? I'm not suggesting that blindly following him is appropriate or that you shouldn't do your own research though....

super useful post thank you! I'm going to go through the various links you posted but one hopefully straightforward query i was hoping for some input on.

It's related to "Choose what you want to invest in before considering which platform to hold it/them on."

So following this, as an example, I go to HL wealth 50 site to look at recommendations, and let's say I pick Fidelity MoneyBuilder Income (Class Y). Let's assume for this exercise that this fund is available in II as well as in HL.

Now let's say I decide to put £50k into this fund.

I can either:
* Go with HL. Here I'd pay 0.45% (platform charge) + 0.36% (hl negotiated fund charge) - about £400 odd quid.
* Go with II 'investor plan' at £9.99/month flat fees. Buy the same fund (assuming it's available) - I can't see anything around fund charge?? i.e. would it end up being £120/year or £120 + 0.56% (what hl claims the fund charge is without hl discount) = a total of £400 as well.

For II - guess it boils down to if I do pay a fund charge which for some reason i can't seem to find clearly articulated. If there is a fund charge, I could be better off going with HL fully managed versus a self-managed II simply due to the negotiated discount fees in holding funds that HL offers?