Investment & Investing

What platform are you using?

I just check the % of my holdings off your article and

Geographic Split
As at 30 Nov 2023, by Country of Listing %
US 67.4
Denmark 11.7
France 11.5
UK 4.6
Spain 3.0
Cash 1.9

I believe if HSBC were to go under you would be entitled to a portion of the underlying equities that are wrapped up in the index fund

if HSBC were to go under

Also you would have bigger, more pressing problems in that situation

Nuclear fallout, for example

To a complete idiot like me, who has their S&S ISA in Lifestrategy 100 since Feb 21, which I know is more UK weighted, is it worth me diversifying (or even moving the funds) at this point? Because I just look at this and go 'not bad' and move on with my day. I don't plan on using it until much later on in life...

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Also you would have bigger, more pressing problems in that situation

While not wanting to be complacenet about global anihillation risks, bank failure is hardly as unthinkable given we had the whole lot of them failing 16 years ago. And the government has put in place scheme for precisely that thing happening again so they must reckon it is the kind of risk that people should take into account!

I believe if HSBC were to go under you would be entitled to a portion of the underlying equities that are wrapped up in the index fund

That sounds messy!

I think your pension would be the least of your problems if HSBC went bust.

Too late.

I was reading up on investment strategies recently, and one article/blog I read was a strong advocate for global tracker funds, as they are basically the best way to spread your exposure globally rather than locally.

On the face of it it doesn't look bad. But you would need to compare it to benchmarks to make a proper assessment - ie what have global equities done over the same time period?

That seems to be the current thinking

Iweb - but the funds are mostly the same across them all.

It's certainly the case that 'global' equities is basically US +

Denmark is surprising, and UK normally slightly bigger than France. And no Germany / Japan - that can't be a global tracker can it?

No. Fundsmith.

Denmark is Novo Nordisk.

Anyway. Coulda, shoulda, woulda had the balls/smarts to buy bitcoin it seems.

Even if HSBC goes under, the fund retains value, as it is priced against the underlying assets.

This.

Unless, of course, HSBC went under because of a paradigm shift towards decentralised finance, and we all dealt in shitcoins and democratised credit.

that sweet ozempic dollar

OK, so people don't invest in multiple funds purely to diversify against fund manager risk?
That was the answer I was looking for!

I did have [money split across] three funds. But sold off two [taking the money elsewhere] and now have everything left in one, but it's not a huge amount. If it was a large amount again I'd have it diversified. But technically it is as some when into buying a house and the other to funding a business. ...

Coulda, shoulda, woulda had the balls/smarts to buy bitcoin it seems.

I guess most of us wish we had invested in it, or invested in it earlier, or more. But it will go down too and then not look so rosy!

Might be worth looking at SWDA. Global trackers have been touted as the only investment that any regular investor needs by Warren Buffett!

My only concern is that part of the stock market success in recent years is the access to trackers improving.

It's worth looking at the composition of the global tracker you're interested in. Some of them are not massively diversified from the magnificent 7.

For what it's worth, that's not necessarily a 32% gain. I've never fully gotten my head around how they calculate that value, but it isn't just (total gain)/(total contributions).

I believe it's a time-weighted return. If I invest £100 for a year and get 100% returns, then invest another £1000, my personal rate of return should be a value closer to 100% than to 9%. The £100 has been in the market a lot longer than the £1000, but the £1000 is a much larger sum, so you need to weight by time. If you just do a simple money out over money in calculation you get a return that doesn't make much sense.

You're not too late tbh.

It's becoming entrenched as an asset class and we can look back in 5 years and laugh at the value today, imo. But yeah it will go down as well as up and be volatile on that journey, while continuing to follow the trend upwards.