Stock market dealing

[Justin Passing]

I said t'other day that I was all in cash. But it niggled at me, when the funds I was in, went up a couple of percent.

I thought things were just about settled for a little while, so I bought back in, some.
Then Sam Altman of Open AI said they'd missed internal targets and the entire AI ecosystem, took a knock.
Aw poo, down a percent or five - some stocks are very sensitive.
Micron Sandisk, and Nvidia are strong still.
I'm long (have money in) Korea, they have a number of very strong high tech companies (Samsung, SK Hynix and a couple of other chip makers), plus, they should get a pop in the prices when Hormuz is eased. But if/when prices crawl back up to where I bought, i'll cut 80%
There are no real save havens right now. Things like Grain are going up, but sentiment will drop their prices rapidly when the outlook is better, long before the actual supply improves.

I just put a lump into CHASE bank at 4.5%. How very boring!

Looks like it's Google's world, but the market has the look of tomorrow being a 3% down day. BU next week, worse.
I think that decision to buy back in will prove expensive!

 

[motorbiking]

Chase is only good for 12 months on the bonus rate.

Spring (Paragon) is close

 

[Justin Passing]

Yes, I WAS expecting to stick it in a StocknSHares account before that. (there's one that's 4.75% for up to 20k, by the way)

I didn't know how these worked in detail, until today: A Gilt

You pay £96.44. On 22 July 27 you get £100
PLus, £1.25pa, biannually
Your total return is 4.35%
SO you get I'd guess two of those , at £1.25 which is the Running Return, 1.31%

The point, is that you pay tax on the interest at your marginal income tax rate.
But the remainder, about 3%, IS TAX FREE regardless whattax band you're in
And of course the thing is SAFE.

Higher rate CGT is 20%, income tax 40% so worth saving.
Something equally safe and similar interest rate like a Money Market Fund, would attract Income tax.

There are other gilts to look at.
COSTS are significant for the short duration, not so bad if you hold a few years if you get one of those.- you can get these things on all the normal platforms or from HMG

You can sell them any time ; you lose the SPREAD, and the price goes up as you reach maturity date.

 

[Justin Passing]

Free stuff. There are loads of very sound, free courses online.

These are great if you don't know that
BULLISH means going up and BEARISH means going down
or that a
CANDLE represents the price range (vertically) in a particular time slot which may be say one minute or one day WIDE.
etc etc etc etc.


I just stumbled into another one through the website BullishBears.com . Give your email and you get 10 free lessons as video presentations.

For any stock trading stuff, get yourself a new email address. It'll be pounded with offers
NB if you see any reference to the PDT rule, ignore it, it never applied in the UK and has now been removed in the USA.

There used to be a good one at Trade Ideas too, not sure if current.

 

[foxhole]

Chase is only good for 12 months on the bonus rate.

Spring (Paragon) is close

You can use the Chase referral bonus to gain another £50 , we keep it in the family , I refer one of my daughters who refers her partner , who refers another daughter etc etc.
Also did it with Monzo bank, easy free money .

 

[Justin Passing]

Gilts = A better place than the building societies.

Your situation may be not suit but consider a lump of cash outside of ISAs etc so it gets taxed as income.
It's extra important if that level of income tax pushes you into a higher rate CGT band.
That means when you add/remove zeroes for your case, check what happens at your tax threshholds:
This is for those who are clear of the tax free zone, but not into higher rate band, and are keen to avoid it.

If you don't have any other Capital Gains ( eg from stocks and sgares investments, you get a £3000 tax free allowance, currently

I gave ChatGPT a reference gilt and a round number

4) Direct comparison (JP numbers)​

Cash (£100k example)​

• 4.5% interest = £4,500
• Tax (20%) ≈ £900
• Net ≈ £3,600

Gilt (same £100k)​

• 1.25% income = £1,250 → taxed
• 3.3% gain = £3,300 → tax-free, exempt from income and CG tax.

Tax:

• £1,250 × 20% = £250

Net:

• £1,000 (income after tax) + £3,300 = £4,300

That assumes you hold the Gilt until expiry. If you do that, those are what you get for that Gilt, regardless.
The Gilt is saleable any time, you aren't locked in, but the price you get between now and the redemption date does depend on Intetest Rates - if they drop, your gilt appreciates and vv.