Investment & Investing

risky

It's just about the most risk-diverse product you can find, I'd have thought (other than diversifying into other asset classes)?

As a basket, it's a basket of everything.

It's not really 1 basket though is it? It's as diverse/representative of the global economy as you're going to get

except that its just 1 type: stocks

as opposed to throwing in bonds and other types of equity

Sure, it's only equities.

If you want to invest in other asset classes you can do that, or you can even get funds which will do it, I think Vanguard LifeStrategy does this.

My triodos ethical investment, investment, has been torrid for 18 months. no surprise. However, and i know this is short term, it has shot up since COP28. maybe a good sign for the world in general. Sadly, perusing the stocks i notice a few things doing well since israel started bombing the shit out of gaza. like Avon protection. dreadful.

sign of fed cuts breathing life into clean energy and biotech stocks/indexes again too

Any particular ones you'd suggest researching (not financial advice)?

INRG is the classic ETF for clean energy

IDNA and HEAL ETFs are good. there are probably some other biotech ones but i like the 'theme' of those ETFs

For a managed fund I do like Polar Capital's healthcare opportunities. Has outperformed the sector strongly over many years. I know many people are averse to actively managed funds but do feel that in the healthcare space they can be worth their salt

INRG has taken a beating over the last few years largely because of the interest rate environment. With sentiment shifting and cuts to come in 2024...
*not financial advice

The Nutmeg ISA I opened 18 months ago is now at an incredible 102% of its original value.

Fuck inflation, I'm winning.

I'm at 2.5% from 3.5 years ago.

Long term returns blah blah, does feel like taking a chunk out and putting it into an easy access saver wouldn't be a terribly bad idea.

I’m at 50% (time weighted).

You just need to be in for a long, long time.

Obvs using it to be a deposit on a house in Kensal rise in 2008 would have been an infinitely better use of the money.

Never understood this with Nutmeg, why is my time weighted 17% and simple return 2.5%?

Yeah. I’ve never really fully understood the time weighted measure. I’m guessing when you haven’t been in for long, and you’ve only made a lump sum deposit there will be a large descrepancy between the two.

I tried to work out how they arrived at the time weighted figure and couldn't work it out. I half suspect they pluck it out of thin air.

i’ve been following the fortunes of bluebird biotech, or rather misfortunes, very interesting to watch, feel bad for them
Edit sorry, in reply bc chipping in on subject of medical/health investment

as have i (as part of my job). would have loved to be a fly on the wall for how they fucked up the EU access so badly... do wonder if they will ever return to europe

what do you think are the options?!

Have you been adding money as you go? I can’t remember exactly how it’s calculated but could it be that the fund is up 17% since you started but you’ve since added money in a lower growth period which has brought down your average growth?

I’ve wondered about Vanguard’s ‘personal return’ figure. Says they use:

We use the money weighted rate of return method to calculate your % Personal return.

How does that compare to an apr or the ‘assumes a 5% return on investment’

Deep dive here if you really want to get to grips with it.

Not really! Found most explanations over complex. I just wanted to know if it’s a decent enough performance figure or some kind of over inflated one taking into account compound interest to make it look better.

It seems to be a decent indicator so I’ll go with it.

I'd have thought that it's not going to be particulary useful for comparing different products, as it is dependent on your own deposits and withdrawals.

It may be useful if you are planning on putting in and taking out money all the time, and will do that irrespective of what you are investing in.

I don't really think it has a huge amount of utility in assessing the performance of a single products that you have invested in - simple returns just make way more sense.

Even of you're doing lots on inflows and outflows, you could just do a simple (or discounted) return in each one separately.

bluebird biotech

goes from bad to worse for them... screaming for a buyout at that sp now. the science is great but feel they have mismanaged a lot of their access strategy. a bigger player could fix this

My last minute rushed LISA opened with £4k last year currently worth £5350 (including the matched 1k)
Topping it up seems like a no brainer?