Does anyone hold an online share dealing account? I am wondering how to transfer my max allowed shares into an ISA from my dealing portfolio? If the equity continues to grow above and beyond the tax free limit, do the earnings spill into the next year ISA?

you can put in the max for the year but the Interest monies can be added on and go over the max! Its what you put into the account has a limit. At least thats how mine has been working for the past few years

You can put in up to the maximum annual limit. This value plus any growth is tax free...without limit. HTH.

I have used iii

Spoke to III the other day and managed to transfer a fund into the ISA. Just got to wait for commercial property market to pick up now!

Im researching financial spread betting at the moment but its going slow, anyone tried that out seriously? Not sports but markets.

I'd be interested in finding out more about this TopChilla...let me know what you find out mate..

spread betting is fun but you can get you're fingers burned quite easily if you're not careful. unless you're doing some research, be careful betting on individual stocks - especially with the markets as volatile as they are at the moment. an up/down bet on an index (i.e. the FTSE) might be a safer way to test the water.

 

i'm not an expert but did you want to know anything in particular?

Umm..I guess just how it works, the stocks/markets you can or are most usual to bet on, etc...any sites that give sound advice? Never really been one for playing the markets but want to try and get into it and I hear/read that spread betting is the new thing...

You chaps might have already browsed this forum but if not, trade2win is a brilliant place to learn some fundamentals.

 

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/first-steps/4629-basics-trading-2.html

spread betting is essentially a bet on which way a stock or index is going to move. you have an account with a broker which you are required to put money into to cover your open bets.

 

betting on single stocks is generally much more risky than on indices.

 

a simple example (ingnoring fees etc.)

- FTSE is at 5300 and you think its going to rise

- you open a position at "£1 per point"

- if the FTSE goes up to 5305 (i.e. up 500 points) you could close your position for £500 profit.

- if it goes down to 5295 then you are sitting on a £500 loss.

 

its a bit more complex that that in practice but thats the idea.

 

that there is no stamp duty, and profits aren't liable for capital gains tax - like when you buy shares. which is good.

 

if your bets are leveraged, then you can potentially stand to lose more than your initial outlay, and if you don't monitor your trades closely and set tight stoploss limits then things can turn in the wrong direction pretty quickly. which is bad

 

if you're looking at it as a bit of fun, prepeared to treat it as a gamble, and comfortable with the idea of losing some money, then by all means have a go but i'd reccomend you pick no more than a few stocks or indices and whatch them for a while before opening a bet, keep your bets small and don't leave them open for too long. perhaps have a practice on a "virtual portfolio" site first.

 

if you are looking to get into the markets as a way of investing for the future, aren't that comfortable with risking your money, and have a longer-term view then stay clear. you'd be better off drip feeding money into a tracker fund (which basically aim to follow the performance of an index over time) you can do this within an isa. once you get more familiar, you might want to look at managed funds (where the fund manager has more scope to buy/sell assets in the fund as prices move in order to try and beat the performance of an index) or start buying shares yourself

 

IG index is one of the main sites for spreadbetting

moneysavingexpert is a good general site for savings and investments advice

fool.co.uk is another good one and has lots of different message boards

 

not sure if any of that is helpful. all my own opinion, of course...

That's very helpful Ste...thanks a lot mate! :bow: