Singing Pig

I have PEPS form 97/98 and 98/99, the plan manager is Fidelity and the investments are in HBOS and Fidelitys own European Fund unit trust.

I have my concerns about the robustness of the global economy and would therefore like to move into a lower risk investment. I need also to consider that in a years time I may need access to the funds.

 My dilema is finding a suitable eligible investment under the stocks and shares rule.

I should mention that Fidelity does not have a facility whereby you can sell your holdings and keep the monies in cash pending further investment. I also have an ISA with Alliance Trust Savings who do allow this, albiet the tax man takes his 20% from the interest earned. I had considered consolidating my investments into Alliance but that can take a few weeks by which time it might be to late.

Another option I looked at were UK corporate bonds but these look likely to perform poorly as interest rates rise, UK equity income is next but I may suffer with only having a 1 year time line. Investing in a vehicle with exposure which is related to the price of gold came to mind bearing in mind that if my concerns about the global economy are correct then the gold prices is likely to rise.

Anyone.............?

Any of the volatile investments can lose considerable money in the short term whilst being excellant long term strategies,perhaps you should consider a cash ISA or high interest bank deposit given your short time horizon

if you wish to keep your stockmarket investments and are familiar with T.A. you can hedge your portfolio when the trend changes,not perfect but prevents catastrophic loss

"you should consider a cash ISA or high interest bank deposit given your short time horizon"

As I'm not certain that I'll need the funds in a years time I wnat to keep the tax free status of the monies so I've decided to take a risk and I'm looking at UK equity income. At least if I do need the monies and the market has crashed then the loss will not be devastating and the onset of a bear market should give me the opportunity to limit any loss. I also have to balance it out with the fact that I've had a very good ROI to date.

Question time :-)

What's T.A?

What's the differences in funds ending in Acc and Inc?

e.g  Rathbone High Income Fund Acc

       Rathbone High Income Fund Inc

There are many examples of this.

I guess the abbreviations mean accumulation and income but why have two funds?

T.A.=Technical Analysis

accumulator re-invests dividends into the fund and income pays them out

You might also consider protected bonds that give you the growth of the stockmarket but guarantee 90-100% of your capital,not sure if any are your timeframe though

if your not familiar with TA don't try to hedge your portfolio with it as it take some time to learn a good starter book is Introduction to technical analysis by martin pring,get the cd as its interactive and tells you when you choose the wrong share

You may also find the HYP board on motleyfool.co.uk worth having a look at if new to shares.Not my cup of tea but a sound strategy(medium term ie 5years+)

Thanks for the T.A recommendation, now that interests me, Are you successfully using this method?

Are you sure the protected bonds are eligible and who offers them?

I've familiarised myself with the HYP strategy from motleyfool and likely to try it out. My pension money is in a SIPP with Allliance Trust Savings, they provide an online dealing service as well as a research tool (think it's Digital Outlook). I had been 100% invested in global growth investement trusts for a number of years but (rightly or wrongly) I recently got cold feet with the global ecomomy. Concerns about recession in the USA re: sub prime collapse, bubble in chinese stocks, vast global indebtness, inflated asset values, extreme weather conditions from global warming and now a renewed terrorism threat. IMHO one major global catastrophy in whatever form could tip the balance. So the upshot is I sold out and I'm 100% in cash and I'm chilling out for a while meantime keeping an eye on world stock markets until I decide on my new strategy. That strategy is likely to be motley fools HYP.

Anyway back on topic, I'm looking at Schroder Income Fund Inc and Norwich UK Equity Income Fund Inc. They have performed well in the recent past and Alliance accepts transfers of these funds if I decide to remain in equities. The Norwich fund has a very impressive performance from a relatively new manager but I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not? The record of Schroders is not so good but there is a long established manager there.

My first choice was Jupiter Income Trust but Alliance does n't administer this fund. I'm keen on Alliance because I like the cost effectiveness of Investment Trusts and they have a good selection and in some cases the same manager manages Unit trusts and Investment trusts of the same or similar names. 

Having mentioned the two funds above I've just realised that they pay out income which is not what I want and Alliance don't list their accumulation funds as ones they administer. Do you think these funds would reinvest income on request or just tell me to invest in the Acc fund? 

I use a combination of fundamental and technical analysis,

yes i am pretty sure they will tell you to invest in the accumulator but may offer a discount for a switch over if asked

Pound cost averaging into an investment fund should remove your fears over market timing are you familiar with this concept?An interesting variation which purchases extra units when prices are low and fewer when they are high is explained in Brian Millards book stocks and share 4th edition(you can get it from the library,I'm a bit tight and like to have a good look before I buy anything)

I have seen Invesco perpetual high income fund mentioned as having a good track record as well as the funds you have mentioned,for me the annual charges over 20 years and the other hidden charges make them unsuitable for me and anyway I enjoy investing

"Pound cost averaging into an investment fund should remove your fears over market timing are you familiar with this concept?"

Yes, a used to "drip feed" my investment trusts.

"An interesting variation which purchases extra units when prices are low and fewer when they are high is explained in Brian Millards book stocks and share 4th edition"

That's an interesting variation !

"you can get it from the library,I'm a bit tight and like to have a good look before I buy anything)"

He he he, I thought it was only me that did things like that :-)

"I have seen Invesco perpetual high income fund mentioned as having a good track record"

Yes that one was near the top of my list but Alliance do not administer this one, perhaps I should forget about that Idea and just go look at performance as I understand that some UT's out perform IT's even though they have higher charges. Spending a lot of time on T.A and looking at fundamentals is not an option at the moment for me, it's an interesting past time, some day maybe.

Best of luck with your investing.

Rob  

Oh yes forgot to mention in the e-mail, screeners and charting,try digitalook.com and advfn.com

As you get more advanced you may wish proper charting software sharescope gold or metastock from equis international,metastock is by far the better tool light years ahead of the uk stuff but you need a data supplier to take care of share splits and rights issues I haven't found one yet so its necessary to buy a new cd every 6 months I use john denham I'll let you have his contact number if you choose this option.sharescope automatically adjust for this but an inferior product IMO