The new pension freedoms introduced on 6th April 2015 gave people more flexibility over how they access their retirement savings. One of the most popular options has been income drawdown, which is where you leave your money invested and take an income from the portfolio. Since the change in the rules more than 120,000 retirees…
One of the advantages of having thousands of funds to choose from is that there is always the chance that you could stumble on a hidden gem. The Independent Investment Trust (IIT) is a good example and shows the benefit of having a free spirited manager who is prepared to back his judgement and put…
A lot of fund managers have struggled in the last few months, but a handful have come through with flying colours. One such is David Crawford, who runs City Financial Absolute Equity. According to data from FE Trustnet, this is the most successful open-ended fund over the last 12 months, with an impressive gain of…
The last few months have been a difficult time for investors, but anyone with money in the Troy Trojan fund will have felt a lot more comfortable than most. Over the course of January its multi-asset portfolio returned 1% compared to a 10.1% fall in the FTSE All-Share. It also did reasonably well in 2015…
January was a difficult month for the world’s stock markets, with weaker economic data in China, the US and the UK casting doubt on the strength of the global recovery. This prompted further intervention by the central banks, with the Bank of Japan adopting negative interest rates on the excess reserves deposited by financial institutions,…
Historically low interest rates have helped many different areas of the market, with one of the biggest beneficiaries being commercial property. Closed-ended funds that invest in property shares have risen by an average of 70.1% over the last five years, which makes it the fourth most profitable sector out of 46. 2015 was a lot…
As seen in the January edition of Master Investor Magazine. At this time of year the financial press is always littered with predictions about which areas of the market are going to produce the best returns. It can be interesting and instructive to look at the different views, but it’s important to remember that nobody…
Neil Woodford is one of the most highly regarded fund managers operating in this country, but despite all his skill and experience his Woodford Patient Capital Trust (WPCT) has generated a negative return over its first nine months of existence. WPCT was launched on April 21st 2015 and quickly rose above the issue price of…
It has been a difficult time for natural resources stocks and energy companies with the slump in commodity prices hitting their profits. The decline has been of such severity that it has had a significant impact on the economies that are dependent on these sectors of the market. One example is Canada, where the fall…
Lots of people are nervous about the prospects for the markets going into 2016 because of the threat of higher interest rates in the US and UK and the risk of a further slowdown in China. Investors who are uncomfortable with the outlook might want to consider a targeted absolute return fund. A good example…
