[ rss / options / help ]
post ]
[ b / iq / g / zoo ] [ e / news / lab ] [ v / nom / pol / eco / emo / 101 / shed ]
[ art / A / beat / boo / com / fat / job / lit / map / mph / poof / £$€¥ / spo / uhu / uni / x / y ] [ * | sfw | o ]
logo
economics
Subject   (new thread)
Message
File  [] []
close
whiteline
linechart.png
754175417541
>> No. 7541 Anonymous
4th June 2019
Tuesday 7:03 am
7541 spacer
One of the UK's most high profile stock-pickers has suspended trading in his largest fund as rising numbers of investors ask for their money back. Neil Woodford said after "an increased level of redemptions", investors would not be allowed to "redeem, purchase or transfer shares" in the fund.

Investors have withdrawn about £560m from the fund over the past four weeks. However, it was a request from Kent County Council to withdraw £250m that led to the suspension.

At its peak, the Woodford Equity Income fund managed £10.2bn worth of assets, such as local authority pension funds. However, it now manages £3.7bn, according to the financial services and research firm Morningstar. Mr Woodford's firm, Woodford Investment Management, is also the biggest investor in Kier Group, the construction and services group which on Monday warned on profits, sending its shares crashing 41%.


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-48506032

"But he hasn't got anything on!" the whole town cried out at last. The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, "This procession has got to go on." So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn't there at all.
103 posts and 7 images omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8479 Anonymous
14th February 2021
Sunday 5:08 pm
8479 spacer
>>8477
Taking punts on biotech is one of the main reasons why his last fund failed.
>> No. 8480 Anonymous
15th February 2021
Monday 10:17 am
8480 spacer
>>8478
>I've always felt that biotech is a mugs game at the best of times. It's all too common for some new work to show a magical result and then for things go quiet until the company unravels, which is a quick process in that brutal world.

Phillip Mirowski has a pretty good take on this, and describes many biotech startups as essentially ponzi schemes:

>> No. 8481 Anonymous
15th February 2021
Monday 8:11 pm
8481 spacer
>>8480

Ponzi scheme implies knowing wrongdoing on the part of the company. As a sciencelad what I would say is that the majority of experiments fail, science is a Darwinian process meaning that its competitive and the massive amounts of failures which occur are necessary to achieve the success that we have (you can't build the penthouse of an apartment complex without first laying foundations and building every floor up until the top one).

In practice this means that some companies may behave in a manner similar to a ponzi scheme for investors who invest blindly without understanding the underlying tech, or knowing what the inner workings of the company look like.

But yeah, it's a punt. $BNGO

Sometimes you have unexplainable successes like Elon Musk with Tesla (this isn't biotech per say but a lot of speculators are looking at this company considering the future potential of Neuralink), other times you have actual fraudulent enterprises like Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos.

The documentary about Theranos is infuriating, because they basically had point of service diagnostics available to consumers from Walgreens which would have revolutionized public health in America and been a sustainable business for them for as long as it would take to develop the machine they were building (but competitors would potentially have been able to replicate their business model), but because they lied to investors they sunk the whole enterprise and set back the mission of consumer diagnostics about a decade. Don't be greedy.

I haven't watched your video because it's an hour long and I am currently rewatching the Curtis stuff, but thanks for sharing. This is the kind of content I subscribe to this subreddit for.
>> No. 8482 Anonymous
16th February 2021
Tuesday 4:05 pm
8482 spacer
>>8481

I think the distinction that Mirowski is making, though, is that the risky stages of the experimentation is often done on public money, then there's a group of private speculators hyping up technologies as they show promise then bolting on the (overwhelming majority) that don't pan out.
>> No. 8559 Anonymous
1st March 2021
Monday 9:53 am
8559 spacer
FCA first alerted to concerns over Neil Woodford’s business in 2015

The Financial Conduct Authority was warned about problems within Neil Woodford’s investment business less than a year after it opened in 2014 but did not intervene for almost another two years, according to several people briefed on the process.

...concerns over its investment strategy were raised within the first year of its operation, when two of the company’s founding partners — chief operating officer Nick Hamilton and chief legal and compliance officer Gray Smith — resigned after falling out with Woodford and chief executive Craig Newman. Given their senior roles in such a high-profile business, Smith and Gray were asked to discuss the reasons for their departures in exit interviews with the FCA in January 2015. The FCA did not act on the information they presented, according to those familiar with the regulator’s dealings with the company.

The four founders had clashed openly over the company’s compliance culture and the level of due diligence carried out on Woodford’s investments in private companies, according to former WIM staff members. Hamilton and Smith were especially concerned with the amounts being committed to unlisted companies.


https://www.ft.com/content/0a8eb45d-c45f-4085-83bb-2f17bdfa2c30

whiteline
>> No. 8441 Anonymous
9th February 2021
Tuesday 5:19 pm
8441 Online-only banks
I'm considering switching my main current account to one of the online-only banks like Starling, First Direct, or even something like Revolut.

Are there any drawbacks to having no branch that I might have overlooked, even as someone not visiting often (or at all)?

A side question: is there a way to evaluate internet banks in ethical terms, like where their investments are and so on?
25 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8467 Anonymous
11th February 2021
Thursday 3:03 am
8467 spacer
>>8466

Well, quite. But as the average age of a pilot is about 50, we might soon see a shortage of them regardless.
>> No. 8468 Anonymous
11th February 2021
Thursday 3:26 am
8468 spacer
>>8467

I think that the airline industry is facing real problems in the medium- to long-term. We'll see a big surge of pent-up demand for leisure travel when restrictions start to be lifted, but I think there will be a sustained reduction in business travel now that people have got used to Zoom and WFH. Some people will be itching to get back to their jetsetting lifestyle, but corporate finance departments have seen that a huge amount of their travel budget doesn't really add anything to the bottom line.
>> No. 8469 Anonymous
11th February 2021
Thursday 4:18 am
8469 spacer
>>8468

The majority of UK (and Irish) airlines, and travel agents, and particularly those companies that are both combined, are already, to be blunt, completely fucked. Most of these companies operate on an expand-every-summer plan, meaning they've already spent all your holiday money on planes, staff, and handling contracts long before you've ever gone on holiday. This works great, unless something happens that stops literally everyone going on holiday, and everyone wants their money back.

Companies like TUI are using recently booked holiday deposits to try to refund customers who couldn't fly a year ago, and it's all going to collapse on them like a house of cards. They don't own planes, they only lease them - so as soon as they look like they're fucked, they'll be forced to bankrupt and their only hope of clawing back income will disappear. This happened to Flybe the very second a corona quarantine was even considered. This will also likely impact the huge companies that lease these aircraft, because any surviving airline will not be thinking about expansion for years. Same goes for ground handling companies, who were already struggling. Very few airlines do their own baggage handling, towing etc, because the equipment and staffing involved is very expensive. You can board, service and fly a plane with about 5 ground staff, but it takes about 10 or 15 to handle bags, refuel, operate steps, tow the plane off stand, etc.

The big holiday airlines are burning through customer money, government bailouts, aircraft parking fees, continuous maintenance (you can't just leave a plane mothballed for months without stacking up very expensive liabilities, and they need to fly every few weeks to remain certified)

There is exactly ONE airline in the UK that has been recognised by the CAA as being competent and prompt with refunds. Literally just one - Jet2. They also happen to own all of their planes, and their holiday business and airline business are technically separate, though both operated under one PLC; even if all holidays are cancelled for the next five years they still own 90 odd planes. They haven't touched a penny of the government money the other airlines have eaten up, and since they're one of the only airlines that does their own ground handling, they do not need to worry about someone like Swissport collapsing and leaving them grounded.
However, they're not a cheap airline. Their tagline used to be 'friendly low fares' but they're pretty much at flag carrier prices now. I think the customer service they'd displayed over the last year will still drive a lot of people to them, because it looks like you can trust your money with them no matter what happens, but there's a huge chunk of punters that can't and won't pay £400 for a flight to the canaries and back when Ryanair does it for £15.
Jet2 are probably an airline you've never heard of unless you're northern, but I expect them to be making big plays as soon as they can, because they're in such a massively good position compared to anyone else. The industry rumour at the start of the pandemic was they could operate for an entire year with zero flights and still be net positive in cash, which is a bit mental for any company, but 1000x so for an airline.

BA will also be fine, because their domestic flights will not ever lose momentum, and they don't really lease aircraft, with the exception of having to wet lease to replace their dodgy 787s a while back, but that's priced in to a BA ticket.

I don't think we'll see any of the big tourist airlines disappear completely within the next few years, as they have investors with deep pockets who will keep them afloat, but ticket prices will be up and flight frequency and certainly expansion will hit the floor. TUI has their fingers in cruiseliners too, and a strong Dreamliner fleet that basically print money, but they're still the shakiest in my opinion. Easyjet have very strong slots and serve the majority of northern irish tourism travel and short domestic, so they'll take a hit but I can't see them bankrupting. If they own planes (I don't know and can't be arsed to look) they will sell or lease a portion of them, or else just pare down the fleet. Ryanair fly too many internal spanish flights to be in real trouble, but pre pandemic their plan was to move their bases to smaller, cheaper airports to cut even more costs, so I can imagine doing that more quickly and more dramatically than they were. A Ryanair pilot also pointed out to be that they could double the price of every single ticket and still more than likely be the cheapest possible flight to any given destination, so there's that too.
Message too long. Click here to view the full text.
>> No. 8470 Anonymous
11th February 2021
Thursday 4:23 am
8470 spacer
>>8468

I completely forgot to address your point about business travel - I think you're right, I can't see how anyone can justify business travel again after this. I'm firmly on the tourism side of the industry though, so can't offer perfect insight into this, but I will say that a lot of the business flights I've dealt with are either lucrative charters or otherwise key personnel who need to be in a specific place to do a specific thing - I wouldn't be surprised if the "meet in person to talk business" type of ticket was only a small slice of the pie in the first place. I will try and get solid numbers.
>> No. 8471 Anonymous
11th February 2021
Thursday 12:43 pm
8471 spacer
>>8470
> I completely forgot to address your point about business travel - I think you're right, I can't see how anyone can justify business travel again after this.

I work in what is probably one of the few industries that absolutely cannot do away with business travel completely so I'm probably biased the other way. I know for a fact that the company I work for has a lot of clients with massive contracts just waiting until we can get people travelling again.

I do agree that the majority of business travel is just people just going on a jolly while using a sales pitch or update meeting as an excuse for an expensive lunch and taking the missus to a nice hotel if you can wing it. I definitely feel that with any luck a lot of that kind of thing will finally be moved online.

whiteline
thumbnail-5e53328468e7fc1732f5eee4e31a3252-1024x68.jpg
746474647464
>> No. 7464 Anonymous
24th February 2019
Sunday 3:15 am
7464 spacer
I've come to seek some very serious financial advice. I'm in my mid thirties but I've never borrowed a penny from an official institution. I'm not quite a pikey but I'm not that far removed if I'm being honest. I've grown up in a culture of working for cash and buying things for cash. Debt is a dirty word in my family and I've always lived within my means.

I've been quite frugal over the years and have managed to put together about 90k in savings. My employment history is sketchy at best and although I've been working since I left school, there are some serious gaps in the official records when it comes to my income.

For the past six months I've been self employed with about 80k a year coming in. All declared and above board.

I've always assumed that I couldn't get a mortgage and I'm still doubtful but I thought it might be worth asking some strangers whether I'm right.

My current overheads are pretty low and at a push I can save a good few grand a month after tax and rent etc. That means I could potentially have a lot more in the bank in the near future.

I desperately want to own a house and I know I could buy something tiny in a shit place with the money I have but I've recently been wondering what I could get if a bank would lend me a big chunk. I don't want anything fancy but it would be nice to have some space in a nice area.

As I said I know nothing about debt so my main questions are do I have any chance of getting a mortgage with only 6 months of official financial stability (and no credit history), and if so, how much would they lend me with 90ish as a deposit?


Message too long. Click here to view the full text.
13 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 7972 Anonymous
3rd September 2020
Thursday 12:53 am
7972 spacer
>>7969
I started thinking that I could cheat the system by paying any credit card purchases off right away. Then, of course, I found out that if you pay it off too often in a given month you equally look sloppy with money. A more cynical man might think this is all an elaborate scam to get people into debt - thereby making the balance sheets look better than they are while creating social control.

I've spent my whole life ignoring pretences and thumbing my nose at authority but now look at me. And I'm only just starting to learn how mortgages do horrible things to people. The banks will probably have me in a dress by the end of the month. Then when I finally do own a home I'll become a petty neighbourhood tyrant in a myopic quest to protect my 'investment' over all else.
>> No. 7973 Anonymous
3rd September 2020
Thursday 1:53 am
7973 spacer
>>7972
>The banks will probably have me in a dress by the end of the month.

Can't say I've ever heard or thought of that, but will definitely suggest it at work tomorrow.
>> No. 7974 Anonymous
3rd September 2020
Thursday 2:23 am
7974 spacer
>>7970

As mentioned upthread, you can get a free credit rating and personalised advice on how to improve it at the link below.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/creditclub/
>> No. 8422 Anonymous
5th February 2021
Friday 10:47 am
8422 spacer
On Experian they have a new boost feature:
https://www.experian.co.uk/consumer/experian-boost.html

You give them access to your bank and they say they can boost your score by sharing the payment details. Unless they find it's bad in which case they won't. Anyone else find that a bit creepy, giving big data access to your bank history and then expecting it's scoring to be accepted when it only shows the good?
>> No. 8432 Anonymous
8th February 2021
Monday 1:45 am
8432 spacer
>>8422
https://www.openbanking.org.uk/customers/what-is-open-banking/

whiteline
>> No. 8350 Anonymous
30th January 2021
Saturday 8:07 pm
8350 Ethical Money
Any of you lads with Triodos Bank? How is it?

I've been thinking about how to not indirectly invest in killing the planet (or cartels), so thinking about switching away from HSBC. From looking it around, it seems that Triodos is the only explicitly 'ethical' bank in the UK; Nationwide and Co-op are just 'not-unethical'. It has a £3 monthly fee, though.

I've also switched my pension fund to UK renewable infrastructure funds, though at present there's so little money in it's not a huge deal.
1 post omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8366 Anonymous
31st January 2021
Sunday 6:59 pm
8366 spacer
Have you considered COOP bank?
>> No. 8377 Anonymous
1st February 2021
Monday 10:43 am
8377 spacer
>>8366
Yes, from what I gather though,
> Nationwide and Co-op are just 'not-unethical'

I'm not averse to either of them - it's a massive improvement over HSBC for each.
>> No. 8379 Anonymous
1st February 2021
Monday 11:10 am
8379 spacer
The biggest drawback I've found with Tdos is that the debit cards fall apart after a year or two. Not in a catastrophic way, you can just see the plastic layers slowly coming apart.

The customer service is excellent, no long queues or endless robot voice loops: right away they put you through to a knowledgeable human being with useful decision-making powers. That alone would make them worthwhile, to me.
>> No. 8406 Anonymous
4th February 2021
Thursday 11:26 am
8406 spacer
If I have a credit card with HSBC and switch to Triodos, I assume the credit card becomes void?
>> No. 8407 Anonymous
4th February 2021
Thursday 12:42 pm
8407 spacer
>>8379
I saw they said the card is made out of corn, but that's not a huge issue really as I tend to pay for everything on my amex and pay that off at the end of the month, so the debit doesn't get much action.

whiteline
22bxNPnranmCYfDxupkMWy4C9aKiQL_original.jpg
761076107610
>> No. 7610 Anonymous
10th July 2019
Wednesday 11:29 am
7610 spacer
My last paternal grandparent died relatively recently. My parents have been advised to set up a Deed of Variation, which is apparently re-writing my grandmother's Will so that their share of the inheritance doesn't go directly to them. The plan is for the funds to go into a trust and they will loan the money from the trust via a Promissory Note, with this liability repaid to the trust when they both die.

At least this is how I understand it. This is meant to allow them to have their cake and eat it; they get their hands on the inheritance but the debt to the trust will in turn reduce the value of their own estate when inheritance tax is calculated. They're well within the inheritance tax thresholds so it's not going to make any real difference unless the legislation is changed considerably, but it was also pitched to them that if an inheritance is placed in trust rather than eventually passed directly to me that it would be shielded if I ever ended up bankrupt or divorced.

This is one of those things that sounds too good to be true. If it isn't then why doesn't everyone do this?
29 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8211 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 5:39 pm
8211 spacer
>>8210
Someone already has paid tax on it. Now the government wants a second bite.
>> No. 8212 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 6:18 pm
8212 spacer
>>8211

By that logic the only form of tax should be sales tax, or income tax, or corporation tax, take your pick. Every pound has tax extracted from it multiple times as it changes hands, and we need that money to set fire to, in offering the gods who oversee the fertility of the Magic Money Tree at the Bank of England.
>> No. 8213 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 6:22 pm
8213 spacer
>>8211 This is the most specious argument, and I don't understand why it gets any traction. Is it some yank thing?

You're about to get a load of money. Pay tax on it.
>> No. 8219 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 11:17 pm
8219 spacer
>>8210

And trees don't grow on roads. Vegetable rights and peace!
>> No. 8220 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 11:36 pm
8220 spacer
>>8219
They'll grow through roads if you let them.

whiteline
>> No. 7978 Anonymous
6th October 2020
Tuesday 7:50 pm
7978 Crypto Currencies
Any interest in a general crypto currency thread? The old Bitcoin one dates back to 2013 and things have moved on a bit since then. I got interested in them earlier in the year and have invested a few grand now, have just been picking up some coins here and there when the prices dip. I'd previously dabbled in funds and shares but was looking for something a bit less dull and with a higher risk/reward ratio.

There are some interesting projects using blockchain technologies that sound like they have potential, I think the Bank of England and the EU are working on their own crypto-currencies and China has one nearly ready to launch. It will be interesting to see where things go over the next few years, one hot topic lately has been decentralised finance (de-fi) where all sorts of financial products can be offered using blockchain tech removing banks etc. from the process entirely. This seems like one of the major benefits to me, carrrying out transactions peer-to-peer without involving any third parties although all exchanges these days require you to provide ID so it's not exactly untraceable, and there is no-one that can help if you lose your private keys or get your coins stolen.
96 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8203 Anonymous
14th January 2021
Thursday 6:17 pm
8203 spacer
>>8202

>I've had hard drives completely stop working

I think if you had a BTC wallet with 7.5k coins on it, you'd have tried a couple more data recovery techniques than you did at the time. I'm not saying his HDD is definitely preserved, but it's not inconceivable that a wallet would survive on even a shattered platter.
>> No. 8205 Anonymous
14th January 2021
Thursday 8:51 pm
8205 spacer
>>8203
> but it's not inconceivable that a wallet would survive on even a shattered platter.

It's not, but it's within the realms of the very unlikely. Assuming that the superblock/MFT is almost definitely corrupted and given that wallet.dat is just a btree type Berkeley DB file, the only way to search for the data you want (the keys) is if you remember the blockchain address you had the coins in and to brute-force search for that pattern as the key in a KV pair - across the entire disk (or whatever parts are readable). In other you'd better hope that the file was small enough to be stored in sequential sectors or you're going to be SOL and you'd better hope against hope that the disk wasn't protected via Bitlocker or LUKS as if even one byte is corrupted you'll be unable to read all the other logically sequential bytes thanks to the wonders of Cipher Block Chaining.
>> No. 8206 Anonymous
14th January 2021
Thursday 8:57 pm
8206 spacer
>>8205

This is why I defragment all of my storage media multiple times per day.
>> No. 8207 Anonymous
15th January 2021
Friday 1:18 am
8207 spacer
>>8206
Forgot your IYKWIM.
>> No. 8992 Anonymous
9th October 2021
Saturday 1:08 am
8992 spacer
could have at least tripled your money if you got BTC a year ago when I posted OP, have fun staying poor lads.

(A good day to you Sir!)

whiteline
>> No. 7993 Anonymous
9th October 2020
Friday 1:17 pm
7993 spacer
I've made the classic mistake of telling people I invest my money. Just my retired parents but I've been asked if I can help start them on doing something with their retirement savings (not their workplace pensions) which I've found out today is "not doing anything" (!)

Of course, I'm going to need to get them talking to a financial adviser but I should make sure I'm clued up myself. Since their retirement they've noticeably slowed down and will probably need me to explain things, make sure they're not getting doing anything stupid and help them manage more and more as time goes on. Any idea on where to start with specifically investing in retirement? It's going to be quite different to how I manage my money now (1. buy high 2. scream) but looking over a few guides from investor platforms I'm unsure on advice around bonds as they're not exactly the stellar investments they once were and putting a big chunk in an annuity scares me.

Just think, soon they might even have a free parker pen DEM CROSSWORDS WNT KNW WOT HIT 'EM
15 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8019 Anonymous
29th October 2020
Thursday 6:38 am
8019 spacer
I just stuff all of my money into Bitcoin, Ethereum, and gold. I own a little bit of land, and I'm still paying of some property. Perhaps I'll but more land in a decade. Fuck getting rich in the short term, preserving wealth in the long term is the safest way to go considering all of the shit that has happened recently. I don't trust central banks with how much money they've just miraculously printed into the economy. The only thing keeping stocks up right now are pension funds I reckon. It's a zombie economy, and It's going to collapse. Pack rice. And tea.
>> No. 8020 Anonymous
29th October 2020
Thursday 7:54 am
8020 spacer
>>8019
>The only thing keeping stocks up right now are pension funds I reckon. It's a zombie economy, and It's going to collapse.

People have been saying this just about every time investing has been brought up over the past 10 years on here.
>> No. 8021 Anonymous
29th October 2020
Thursday 8:46 am
8021 spacer
>>8020
Every investment forum in the past 100 years has people like him. You can afford that worldview if you already have property and gold.
>> No. 8166 Anonymous
8th January 2021
Friday 6:13 pm
8166 spacer
So what's the deal with TSLA?
>> No. 8167 Anonymous
8th January 2021
Friday 6:15 pm
8167 spacer
Also ETFs (like Global x and ARK) look like they have pretty good yield and spread risk across a portfolio of emerging tech companies.

They tend to be organized around a theme (electric cars, robotics, next gen internet, medicine etc)

whiteline
>> No. 8022 Anonymous
28th November 2020
Saturday 5:26 pm
8022 spacer
In strictly income related terms, what is 'doing alright' in 2020? What is middle class?

There are rules of thumb that were established a long-time ago, earning your age being something of a minimum standard while earning 40-60k meant you owned an Aldi. You will probably notice that these rules originate from the 00's though and while calculators do exist they seem to apply national averages which seems odd as a large bottom doesn't mean you eat lots of camembert.
24 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 8068 Anonymous
31st December 2020
Thursday 6:27 am
8068 spacer
>>8067

It's a different risk/reward tradeoff, that's all. Training as a mechanic will provide you with a reliable income that you can raise a family on. Getting a degree might give you a start in a great career, but it might also end up being an albatross; that's especially true if you don't have the wealth and family connections that are all too often essential in getting your first break. Middle-class kids can afford to aimlessly shamble through their 20s until they figure it out, but working-class kids don't have that kind of safety net and need to hit the ground running.

It's also worth pointing out the hidden pitfall in student funding - maintenance loans. Even if you're entitled to the full loan, it's nowhere near enough to live on in most cities. That's no real problem if your family can afford to send you a few quid if you can't find a part-time job, but it causes a lot of working-class kids to drop out in their first year because they just can't make ends meet.
>> No. 8069 Anonymous
31st December 2020
Thursday 10:18 am
8069 spacer
The people I know from school who are doing best tend to be the ones who trained to be electricians and plumbers and the like rather than those who went to university. We left school in 2004.

I suppose it's about getting some decent career advice early on in your life. There are people who didn't go to university and learned a lucrative trade and those that have a menial minimum wage job, just like some people who went to university and have carved out successful careers and others who didn't have a clue what they were doing and are still working in call centres. What really matters is having a career plan and direction towards being successful.
>> No. 8070 Anonymous
31st December 2020
Thursday 1:32 pm
8070 spacer
>>8067
Actually all careers in trades require a ridiculous amount of time to break into earning proper money and most don't because of the significant informal barriers for independent plumbers, carpenters etc.

Mechanic is especially bad because you're working in a freezing cold garage paying off debts to big-toolbox with a sketchy employer. My brother did it for 10 years and was miserable while his mate went to uni to study engineering so he could get a cushy job working for Mercedes.

>>8069
This is the opposite experience for me because I left school before the Great Recession. Maybe I just didn't grow up in as big a shithole as I remember but a fair few went on to be solicitors and the like.

Although I'll agree that if you have shit-for-brains and don't pull your finger out then you're going to have a hard time. I suspect daddy's money is being a bit overstated here as you can dodge call centre bullshit by securing internships or just being aware that places like the government are always hiring. Obviously university should also be about learning and doing what you want to do because ultimately I'd hazard most don't end up in their career path and struggle in something shite because they feel they have to. Who knows how much talent has been wasted this way.
>> No. 8071 Anonymous
1st January 2021
Friday 1:24 am
8071 spacer
>>8070

>a fair few went on to be solicitors and the like

Between an oversupply of graduates and cuts to legal aid, a lot of solicitors are really struggling financially. Top graduates can still find entry-level jobs paying £100k+ in a top London firm, but at the other end of the spectrum you've got people doing Legal Aid work earning less than minimum wage.
>> No. 8072 Anonymous
1st January 2021
Friday 8:59 am
8072 spacer
>>8071

I've also read recently (>>29347) that background matters a lot. Students from poorer backgrounds who go to the same universities and earn the same grades (e.g. earning a first at Cambridge) still earn considerably less than their more well off peers.

whiteline
>> No. 7939 Anonymous
11th July 2020
Saturday 9:52 pm
7939 spacer
The cut in stamp duty has opened the door for me to be able to buy a flat in near the city for myself -so long as I borrow 2k from my parents and use help to buy. I looked at what that really means which is that I can afford a small flat in Kingston by the sewage works with 2 hours commuting everyday.

Lads, is it still worth it? Yeah, my money isn't magically disappearing every month but my quality of life would be worse and, at 30, I will likely look to move in a few years with some bird. Still, there's a money factor involved so I've been fretting all week. Should I keep looking into this or just forget about it?
Expand all images.
>> No. 7941 Anonymous
12th July 2020
Sunday 8:03 am
7941 spacer
>>7939
It's always a good time to buy your own place if you can get the funds together and deal with the 6 months+ heartache it all tends to take. If your parents are able to help you, then take that help; most of us don't get it and you and they are lucky to be able to do it.

Commuting is rapidly going out of fashion. Depends on what job you're in, of course, but I think the homeworking/flexible hours thing is here to stay.
>> No. 7976 Anonymous
19th September 2020
Saturday 2:44 pm
7976 spacer
>>7941
I broadly agree, but there is a big difference between a free hold, a lease hold and owning a flat. The former has no "hidden" fees, the middle has ground rent which tends to be fairly nominal while the latter has service charges which can easily reach several thousand pounds a year. So on top of your mortgage your effectively still paying rent. Make sure to have a chat with other owners in the building if you buy a flat to find out how onerous the lease holders are. And (fat chance in The City) if several of you are long term owners, see if you can acquire the lease nad form a co-op.
>> No. 7977 Anonymous
19th September 2020
Saturday 4:27 pm
7977 spacer
>Cut in stamp duty

ike all these sorts of actions this will just lead to increased house prices. It is good only for speculators, builders and boomers. I fucking hate it.

whiteline
>> No. 7944 Anonymous
24th July 2020
Friday 5:27 pm
7944 HMRC Shittiness
So I've just received entirely out of the blue from HMRC, a demand for inheritance tax of a few thousand pounds, dated about 13 years ago.
I've never received any inheritance in my life. The only thing that could vaguely be linked to anyone I know would be a few hundred stuck in my ISA at the time which could have came from my grandparents before they died a few years later but that's a huge longshot as it would have been from cash via my parents.

What do I do next? The only option I can see is sitting on the phone all day when they open monday and asking for proof.
My assumption would be that they've got me mixed up with someone else but I don't know what my recourse is.
10 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 7955 Anonymous
27th July 2020
Monday 12:44 am
7955 spacer
>>7954
And as >>7953 says, pick the number off their website, not any communication you've received.
>> No. 7956 Anonymous
27th July 2020
Monday 9:47 am
7956 spacer
>>7955 Have you typed a couple of key sentences from the letter into google, see if it's a common scam?
I'd say, if you can't get through to them easily, then just ignore it and wait to see if another letter arrives. If it's genuine (and it isn't), the taxman can hardly fault you for not jumping to attention on a 13 year old matter they've just dug up, especially as you know it's bollocks.
Scammers rely on the feeling of panic to get people to pay. Treat this like an Indian sounding dude calling from Microsoft to discuss the viruses on your BT line. It's only getting to you because it's your first go round.
>> No. 7958 Anonymous
27th July 2020
Monday 9:53 am
7958 spacer
Solved (touch wood)
The number on the letter was the debt management team, they couldn't do anything other than payment so they told me I had to ring the inheritance tax team.
Got passed around 3 different people before getting through to someone who could help.

Apparently, as I thought in my earlier post, the person who died had the same name as me (very rare surname, common as muck first name), and seemingly in passing the records onto the debt management team someone hasn't checked the details right.
Should get a letter in a few days confirming I have no connection to the debt.

To the people saying it could have been a scam:
Yes I know there are a lot of scams along these lines, and I would give anyone else the advice to treat it as such. But I know what to look out for and at no point in this particular scam was there anything to suggest otherwise, with the exception of that first phone number on the letter not being published on the internet.
>> No. 7959 Anonymous
27th July 2020
Monday 12:13 pm
7959 spacer
>>7958 the person who died had the same name as me

This seems like a bit of a punt, even for a debt collection arm.
Surely looking for someone still alive would improve their chances.
>> No. 7960 Anonymous
27th July 2020
Monday 3:52 pm
7960 spacer
>>7959

Odd as it might seem, inheritance tax is levied against the person who died rather than the people who inherit their estate. The reasoning is perfectly sensible albeit rather complicated, but it does lead to the uncomfortable fact of debt collection agencies chasing after dead people.

whiteline
>> No. 7934 Anonymous
11th July 2020
Saturday 6:55 pm
7934 spacer
How crazy is it to buy a flat/house in Liverpool area as an investment?

Are there any chances of development in this area or it will stay as it is for the foreseeable future? I am quite sure it won't return to the past industry (pic very much related).
2 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 7937 Anonymous
11th July 2020
Saturday 8:47 pm
7937 spacer
Prescot is an absolute shithole right now, but it's on the cusp of major regeneration. They're building a £20m Shakespearean theatre which is due to be completed in 2022; they're also putting £14m into a new train and bus station. You can get a modern two-bed flat for less than £80k, which I reckon is a safe bet with considerable potential upside.
>> No. 7938 Anonymous
11th July 2020
Saturday 8:56 pm
7938 spacer
>>7936
Property investing allows for leveraging. £20k in equities in ISA doesn't look as attractive when it's compared to being used as a deposit on a ~£100k house.
>> No. 7940 Anonymous
11th July 2020
Saturday 9:59 pm
7940 spacer
>>7938
>£20k in equities in ISA doesn't look as attractive when it's compared to being used as a deposit on a ~£100k house.

I've never known an ISA to need an emergency plumber or tenants kicking out. If you're leveraging that kind of investment then you need a good wash and putting in the cupboard because you're a mug.
>> No. 7942 Anonymous
12th July 2020
Sunday 8:04 am
7942 spacer
>>7934
I know lots of people who have moved from the South to the area because it is affordable. Lots of areas around Merseyside are very decent places to live.
>> No. 7943 Anonymous
12th July 2020
Sunday 10:36 pm
7943 spacer
We've got the best organised crime outside of London. Try Seascale instead.

whiteline
>> No. 7878 Anonymous
6th June 2020
Saturday 12:29 pm
7878 Looking to buy an occasional flat in South London.
My husband told me not to post this but we are looking for a property that we can spend a few hours in each week.

It needs to be close to pubs and clubs but away from any noise. A safe room would be a bonus but we think we can cope without one.

My budget is 1 Million pounds sterling.

Any help would be welcome.
17 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 7925 Anonymous
17th June 2020
Wednesday 12:51 pm
7925 spacer
>>7896

I hate to say it, but after looking locally, I'm not sure London is ever the answer. Look at this fucking monstrosity - I absolutely love it. Look at the fucking pool.

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-74326684.html
>> No. 7926 Anonymous
17th June 2020
Wednesday 1:13 pm
7926 spacer
Sorry I'm posting here with actual millionaires (even if it's not liquid)?

Fuck me I thought we were all uni and early career lads getting Tesco 2 for £10 meals.
>> No. 7927 Anonymous
17th June 2020
Wednesday 1:23 pm
7927 spacer
>>7926

I was all that ten years ago. If you study hard at a useless degree and accidentally fall into a completely different career amd fail upwards, you too could be booking a viewing of a mafia mansion in 2030.
>> No. 7928 Anonymous
17th June 2020
Wednesday 1:25 pm
7928 spacer
>>7926
I'd have said the average age here is about 30 to 35, but there's certainly old farts amongst us.
>> No. 7929 Anonymous
17th June 2020
Wednesday 1:41 pm
7929 spacer
>>7926
I'm with this lad. No idea everyone on here was on 6 figures.

If one of the mintedlads on here wouldn't mind chucking us a few grand...

whiteline
>> No. 7910 Anonymous
12th June 2020
Friday 8:27 pm
7910 spacer
I've never had a loan before, but a car that I really want to buy has come up. It's about £5k, which I don't presently have in cash. With the interest rates and shit plummeting, is now a good time to get a small loan for a first time?

I have a credit score of 999 according to Experian, have never missed a payment on anything (and pay all my credit cards off in full every month). I work full time and was considering getting £5k over 18 or 24 months.

Any tips for a first time creditee? Should I just go with my bank (HSBC) or a dedicated car loan? I'll be buying privately.
8 posts omitted. Expand all images.
>> No. 7919 Anonymous
12th June 2020
Friday 10:10 pm
7919 spacer
>>7918
I was actually going to comment on that; my current car gets about 30mpg average (35 if I'm careful), and the LS400 gets 23 (27 if you're careful), so it wouldn't be a massive amount different in fuel considering I only do about 5,000 miles a year, most of which are motorway. It's a strictly pleasure and convenience car - I wouldn't buy it for commuting.
>> No. 7920 Anonymous
12th June 2020
Friday 10:20 pm
7920 spacer
>>7919

I assumed you knew what you were getting yourself into, though I will say that 20mpg really does feel a lot, lot less than 30mpg in real world conditions, though if you're mostly going for motorway cruises it won't be so terrible. And the option is always there for an LPG conversion - if I buy one (and I probably will, I have a JDM fetish) then that's what I'll do, a little 50 litre tank in the spare wheel well.

I'm definitely not judging, my supercharged mini does 25mpg ish, and that's my daily driver.
>> No. 7921 Anonymous
13th June 2020
Saturday 8:21 pm
7921 spacer
Got a loan from HSBC 6.1% for 30 months (and as and when I can, I will be overpaying), so a total of 5390 on 5k which is fine by me. It's my bank too so there's just less faff or people to deal with.

Took it for a test drive today and it's absolutely mint. Getting it tomorrow.
>> No. 7922 Anonymous
13th June 2020
Saturday 8:33 pm
7922 spacer
>>7921

Good stuff lad, please do post a photo/thoughts of it in the /mph/ thread.
>> No. 7923 Anonymous
14th June 2020
Sunday 7:53 am
7923 spacer
>>7921
Nice work, that's a very reasonable price for a loan - if you can get it from your bank, they are usually the cheapest.

whiteline
>> No. 7872 Anonymous
14th May 2020
Thursday 1:03 pm
7872 spacer
If I receive a marketing email which starts with "The global market for robots is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 26% until 2025." then it's most likely to be bollocks, right?

https://www.legalandgeneralgroup.com/media-centre/press-releases/lgim-launches-robotics-and-automation-unit-trust-index-fund/
Expand all images.
>> No. 7873 Anonymous
14th May 2020
Thursday 11:00 pm
7873 spacer
Yes. If it's from an unsolicited email it is a scam.

You can get around >10% at high risk doing ForEx, you can certainly make 20-odd percent if you gamble right, but like all gambles you can also lose all of it. These kinds of gains are for short term gamblers. Sure, you can bet big and if you hit it big you can say I told you so but for the most part you'd need someone who is incredibly well versed in a particular industry to second guess it.

If you don't expect to make enough profit to pay a personal accountant (hey they can be cheap around £150) every year, don't bother.

whiteline
Delete Post []
Password  
[0] [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]