An HMRC paper promised in the Budget could be bad news if you use Airbnb. The government has set out a call for evidence relating to rent-a-room relief in response to the rise in short term rentals facilitated by Airbnb and its competitors. Rent-a-room relief is typical of some of the neglected parts of the…
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The long-running saga of the final spring Budget and subsequent Finance Bills is one step nearer the end. The Chancellor’s spring Budget was thrown into disarray by the snap election. It was billed as the last spring Budget, since from now on all Budgets will be autumn events. However, only about a fifth of the…
Read morePension flexibility two years on – the report card The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has examined the impact of pension flexibility and is worried about the lack of advice. Pension flexibility came into effect in April 2015. In theory, since then it has been possible from age 55 onwards to withdraw your entire money purchase…
Read moreThe government has announced plans for a further increase in state pension age. On the day before Parliament shut up shop for its summer holidays, David Gauke, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, announced that the government had decided state pension age (SPA) should be increased to 68 between April 2037 and April…
Read moreUK companies paid out a record amount in dividends in the second quarter of this year. At a time when there is much heated debate about whether the Bank of England should double its base rate to 0.5%, it can be easy to forget the much higher income yield available from UK shares. While most…
Read moreLast month saw the first suggestions that interest rates could increase soon. In June, the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, increased short term interest rates for the second time this year and the fourth time since December 2015. The 0.25% increase to 1.00% − 1.25% had been well signalled by Fed officials, so there…
Read moreThe latest inflation numbers show prices rising at their fastest rate for nearly four years. The May inflation data came as a surprise to many pundits. The expectation had been for inflation, as measured by the Consumer Prices Index (CPI), to remain at April's level of 2.7%. Instead, National Statistics revealed that annual inflation had…
Read moreThe first six months of 2017 have presented investors with an interesting half year. 2017 Change to 30 June FTSE 100 +2.4% FTSE All-Share +3.3% Dow Jones Industrial +8.0% Standard & Poor's 500 +8.2% Nikkei 225 -1.1% Euro Stoxx 50 (€) + 4.6% Shanghai Composite +2.9% MSCI Emerging Markets (£) +11.5% Think about the first…
Read moreNo, it's not a mistake, but it is not the FTSE 100, either. The most frequently quoted index of UK share prices is the FTSE 100 index, or the "Footsie" as it is frequently described. The FTSE 100 index was launched at the end of 1983, with the aim of giving a yardstick to the…
Read moreThe latest Quarterly Inflation Report (QIR) from the Bank of England has been published and shows that 'the Old Lady' has changed her mind a little. But the market projections for short-term interest rates don't make for helpful reading for those with cash deposits. The QIR was published in May, a few days before the…
Read moreThe 2017 election manifestos offered little good news on the future of income tax. Judging by the manifestos of the three main political parties, the days of appealing to voters by cutting income tax (and its alter ego, national insurance) are over: The Conservatives repeated their 2015 manifesto promise of a personal allowance of £12,500…
Read moreThe market most associated with US technology shares reached a new high in April. You may be old enough to remember that the end of the 20th century was marked by a surge in the value of technology shares in the United States. Many of these were traded on the NASDAQ market, which became synonymous…
Read moreThe Budget confirmed the rate on the new National Savings & Investments Bond. 2.2% That is the fixed rate on the “welcome break for hard-pressed savers” which Mr Hammond confirmed in last month’s Budget. The new NS&I three year fixed rate bond will be available from April for a period of 12 months. The maximum…
Read more6 April marks the launch of a new ISA variant, the Lifetime ISA (LISA). One of the last surprises produced by George Osborne in his final Budget was the announcement of the Lifetime ISA. Shortly after Mr Osborne was replaced it began to look as if the LISA, as it inevitably became known, would suffer…
Read moreFor much of 2015, inflation barely existed. On the government’s chosen measure, the Consumer Prices Index (CPI), annual inflation oscillated between 0.3% and -0.1%. 2016 was a rather different story: the starting point was 0.3%, but by December prices were rising by 1.6% a year. The sharp rise over the year is mainly the result…
Read moreAt first sight, the results from the world's main share markets in 2016 appear mixed, but that's before currency effects are considered. Index 2016 Change FTSE 100 +14.4 FTSE All-Share +12.5% Dow Jones Industrial +13.4% Standard & Poor's 500 +9.5% Nikkei 225 + 0.4% Euro Stoxx 50 (€) + 0.7% Shanghai Composite - 12.3% MSCI…
Read moreIt may feel like Mr Hammond’s Autumn Statement was only a few days ago, but shortly before Christmas the Treasury announced that the Spring Budget will be on Wednesday 8 March. In theory, this will be the last Budget to take place in spring, as in November Mr Hammond announced he would be reverting to…
Read moreOn 15 December, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) raised its key short term interest rate by 0.25%, to a range between 0.5% and 0.75%. It had made the same increase 12 months previously. When the Christmas 2015 rate rise occurred, the central bank was implicitly expecting to raise rates four times during 2016. However, a…
Read moreOn the day of the referendum, a pound would buy you nearly $1.50. It dropped sharply in the wake of the vote and then spent about three months churning between roughly $1.35 and $1.30. October produced another leg down to the $1.22 area as a ‘hard’ Brexit began to seem more likely. An 18%+ fall…
Read moreInflation rose to 1% in September, but that will not be the end of the story. Last month a spat between Tesco and Unilever over the pricing of products under a new contract saw Marmite temporarily removed from the shelves of Tesco’s internet shopping website. The two parties resolved the issue quickly once it hit…
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