In the News

Decimalisation 50 years on

Shillings and pence were replaced with ‘new pence’ on 15 February 1971, in what proved to be quite a complex process. On ‘D-Day’ businesses had to switch their accounting and pricing to decimal, banks had to adapt their part-computerised, part-manual systems and everyone had to learn the new system, including school children. Decimalisation made life much simpler, even if it meant saying goodbye to old friends such as florins, half crowns and ten bob notes.

Investors increasingly opt for responsible funds

A record quarterly amount of over £7bn had been invested into responsible investment funds by the end of Q3 2020, compared to £1.9bn invested during the same period in 2019. Statistics for September alone show responsible investment funds saw a net retail inflow of £975m for the month. Such funds under management stood at £40bn at the end of September, representing 3% of total funds under management1.

Capital Gains Tax review

The Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) has published its first of two reform reports on Capital Gains Tax (CGT) which calls for CGT to be set at the same rate as Income Tax, which could raise a substantial amount of tax for the Exchequer. A lowering of the annual exemption is also recommended – the OTS estimates that the number of CGT taxpayers would double if the allowance were reduced to £5,000.

Fund managers largely optimistic for 2021

A survey2 has found that 74.5% of all fund managers expect the economy to improve in 2021. Of these, 28% expect it to be ‘much better’ and 46.5% ‘slightly better.’ Only 15.5% expected performance to be worse in 2021 and the remainder thought the economy would perform about the same.

1Investment Association, 2020

2BDO, 2020

The value of investments can go down as well as up and you may not get back the full amount you invested. The past is not a guide to future performance and past performance may not necessarily be repeated.