Intelligent Money - your investment questions answered

Intelligent Money - your investment questions answered

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Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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Vol 2 continuation thread is here https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...



Hello from Intelligent Money. We are an investment provider, ISA plan manager and Pension/SIPP provider.

Established in 2002 we are FCA Authorised & Regulated and have been entrusted to run £2bn of client money.

Our Private Client services offers fully managed ISAs and Pensions (with SIPP commercial property functionality) without the added expense of platform and adviser fees, whilst still providing full financial support from your Private Client Manager.

PHers can remove our initial charge and minimum investment requirement by inserting the code PH2607 in the ‘Notes’ box when setting an account up online.

We sponsored this thread to give definitive answers to investment questions and explain industry jargon in plain English.

Our aim is to make this into a reference source on all investment and investing matters to the collective PH.

Of course we welcome input from the other informed PHers who help so much in the Finance forum.

So any questions please ask and we will respond. If a question requires you giving personal information you do not want to share publicly then please contact us on 0115 94 84 200 or at privateclients@intelligentmoney.com.

Thanks

Disclosure

JulianPH here is the CEO of Intelligent Money

Nik (who posts under Intelligent Money) runs Private Clients

CoopsIM is a Private Client Relationship Manager who works closely with Nik

Intelligent Money

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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MWM3 said:
I'll start...

Passive or Active?
Thank you MWM3, a very good (and difficult) first question to answer!

Statistically Passive wins. Buy (and sell) the right Active funds (and you have to be right all the time) and Active will always outperform though, by default of you holding the best performing funds at the right times.

Active funds mainly work on stock selection. Passive funds represent a particular market as a whole.

If you invest in a market (Passive) then, tracking error aside, you will get very close to the market returns. If you spend more money investing in a stock picker (Active) then you are paying more money for someone to pick the stocks that will beat the market. Most don't, but some do. Of those who do even fewer do so consistently.

If you use your head you would select Passive (trackers). Your heart may go for Active stock picking though.

William Littlewood, Neil Woodford, Anthony Bolton, Michael Lindsell, Nick Train and Terry Smith are some of the best stock pickers. But they don't always outperform the markets they invest in, miss huge growth opportunities and still lose money during market falls.

If you catch any of these at the right time you should outperform markets, but you have to sell at the right time too.

Equally, picking the best stocks in a dead market is a waste of time. Tracking the best performing markets will give a far higher return.

Another myth is that Active management can reduce losses in falling markets. There is no statistical evidence that supports this.

So... We go for Active asset allocation into Passive investment funds (Trackers). Going forward we may be right or maybe wrong, but historically it has worked very well for our clients.

I am sorry that was such a long winded response, I just wanted to cover everything.

Regards

Nik

Intelligent Money

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Friday 11th January 2019
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selmahoose said:
Intelligent Money said:
Going forward we may be right or maybe wrong, but historically it has worked very well for our clients.

Intelligent Money
If an investor-for-income client handed you £100k to do with as you thought fit, how much income (historically based) do you think you'd be giving them a year later whilst retaining the original £100k to invest again the following year?

Edited by selmahoose on Friday 11th January 19:12
Our balanced Income Portfolio has returned an average over 7% a year after charges over the last 5 years - on top of capital preservation.

Obviously our Growth Portfolio has delivered more and our cautious portfolio has delivered less.

We are awaiting our next quarterly results, which we expect to give smaller annual returns due to global markets falling and hitting everyone over the last quarter. We do, however, expect our asset allocation models to have mitigated much of this. I'll post them next week.

Best regards,

Nik

(Intelligent Money)



Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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Brads67 said:
Rolex or Lambretta ? smile
Rioja or Lambrini?

tongue out

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
Intelligent Money said:
We do, however, expect our asset allocation models to have mitigated much of this. I'll post them next week.
You forgot this bit! wink

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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rfisher said:
Bookmarked.

This is going to get messy.
That would be a great shame.

We have set aside team members with over 100 years of combined knowledge, experience and qualifications to honestly and openly answer any investment related questions people have.

We have no agenda to push our services (but will happily answer questions on this too) and no desire to get into arguments.

We are simply providing a free resource to PHers to enable greater understanding of investments, pensions, ISAs, SIPPs, taxation (and so on) to enable people to make more informed decisions, take more control and save money.


Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
selmahoose said:
Well that tells me that over a specific 5 year time period I would have AVERAGED a certain amount.

And also tells me that you have different portfolios that would have delivered me different results.

And also suggests that recent market downturns indicate that the current year will be lower than that 5 year average despite some mitigatory effort.

But, Nik, what I'm asking is how much income you think you'd be giving me next year if I give you 100k to invest for me in any way you choose?

I might be wrong, but as an investor for income I think it's quite reasonable to ask how much income I should expect from an investment.

If the answer is "I don't know. It largely depends on market conditions but could possibly be very little, zero, or even a loss" then simply say so.

Alternatively, if 100 years of experience tell you that it would be somewhere between, say, £2k and £20k (or whatever other figures experience tells you are possible) then simply say that.
With respect, you asked me:

selmahoose said:
If an investor-for-income client handed you £100k to do with as you thought fit, how much income (historically based) do you think you'd be giving them a year later whilst retaining the original £100k to invest again the following year?

Edited by selmahoose on Friday 11th January 19:12
This is the question I answered.

Asking how much income you could expect to receive from a diversified portfolio over the next year is akin to asking how much growth could you could expect to receive.

It is not that I am unable to answer this, it is that nobody is able to answer - as it is an impossible question (and therefore not quite reasonable).

I trust you do not consider this answer to be evasive, but if anyone tells you they can predict this you should run a mile.

So, the answer to your current question is that I, nor anybody else, knows what future market returns will be.

What I can say with great certainty however, is that if your focus is on a 12 month window of return then none of our investment portfolios would be suitable for you.

You would be better off looking at deposit accounts or potentially AAA rated corporate bonds that you held until redemption. However, the capital value of both of these would be eroded by inflation so you would have to take this into account. You may still have £100k, but it won't be worth the same as £100k today.

I hope this address your question. Please let me know if there is anything else I can assist with.

Regards

Nik






Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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Derek Chevalier said:
I think you'd need to clarify if by "stock picker" you meant the ability to generate alpha.
Hello Derek

I didn't actually.

For clarity, I consider a 'stock picker' as being an investment/fund manager who picks stocks with the aim of outperforming their respective market(s) (which is, of course, the definition of Alpha).

I do not remotely suggest they actually have the ability to do this though! wink

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
Derek Chevalier said:
Ach groak, yer bum's oot the windae. This is a typical question (IMO) asked by someone with a tilt towards property investing (I've had similar before and it's very hard not to answer with a flippant response).

1. You shouldn't be investing in the markets if your time horizon is a year (and you know this smile).
2. But as you ask.....could be an enormous range of outcomes depending on what your risk appetite is and what the markets have in store for us (which no one knows, and if someone says they do, tell them to awa' n bile your head)
You beat me to it! biggrin

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
selmahoose said:
Derek Chevalier said:
Ach groak, yer bum's oot the windae. This is a typical question (IMO) asked by someone with a tilt towards property investing (I've had similar before and it's very hard not to answer with a flippant response).

1. You shouldn't be investing in the markets if your time horizon is a year (and you know this smile).
2. But as you ask.....could be an enormous range of outcomes depending on what your risk appetite is and what the markets have in store for us (which no one knows, and if someone says they do, tell them to awa' n bile your head)
Regarding '1)', some people definitely invest in the markets for income and this isn't done with any horizon. It's done to generate an earner to live on. So IMO it's perfectly reasonable to want an idea of how much of a living the investment will provide.

2) Well assuming Nik/IM agrees then as I said that's one possible direct answer. ie there is no answer, and this type of investment has no accurately predictable outcome. And I accept that.

But in this case it doesn't depend on my risk appetite because my question involved dumping the money on Nik and leaving it to him to decide what to invest in. Leaving it to the expert, as it were.

As to "flippant responses", apart from 'I saaay, Rupert' efforts at music hall Scottish accents (it's 'bile yer heid', btw) I'd love to see you try to do 'flippant'. Come on! Geez yir a-gemme staun-up ya bammy fanny! smile
Regarding 1) They do, but not for 12 months, that is madness! Past performance can be an indication of different investment strategies over different market conditions, but is not a reliable indicator of future returns as no one knows what the future will bring. This is why a minimum of 5 years is always put forward for investment (and diversification).

BTW, I am not an investment manager, I'm a Private Client account manager. I liaise between my clients and all other team members involved in running their account(s). So more like a private banker who knows you by name, rather than you having to explain the same things to different people all the time. I'm also a level 4 (Dip) qualified financial adviser (though I don't give or charge for financial advice - I just help my clients achieve their financial planning goals and act as their personal contact).

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
selmahoose said:
Intelligent Money said:
Regarding 1) They do, but not for 12 months, that is madness!
Wot, like 1 year fixed rate bonds? How's that madness?
1 year fixed rate bonds are not stock market investments! This is why I suggested them (if you have a 1 year investment horizon).

Having a 12 month horizon for stock market investing was the 'madness' bit!

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
quotequote all
selmahoose said:
A lame wizened ill-smelling old pensioner arrives at your plush Nottingham office having travelled 100's of miles from Wick thru unspeakably inclement weather on the back of his long suffering mangy tired donkey. Clutched in his claw is a tatty leather bag stuffed with the coin he has assembled thru a lifetime of grafting and conniving. But it's finished now. Age and hard work have taken their toll and he now needs to spend what time and energy he has left attending to his and his tubercular hag of a wife's simple survival needs. He has heard tell that you are Investors! That you take people's money and make more out of it than they gave you!

He wants you to do this for him. And he wants to live on the "more" bit. He has retained enough to survive for a year, but after that he would require to withdraw the "more" bit and leave you the original amount to do the same with the following year. And the following, and the following, until both he and the toothless hag are no more!

You say that this is impossible!

Well, back in Wick, Young Donal told him that if he gives him some of the bag o' coin to buy pigs with, then every Michaelmas, Lent, and Christmas he will have a pig for himself plus two loaves of bread!! And Big Fergus has said he'll do something similar with his crops.

Seems you might need an introduction to Young Donal and Big Fergus!!


Edited by selmahoose on Saturday 12th January 14:26
As luck happens, I stay (live) in Scotland too (though not as far north as you), so I could lessen your journey! wink

You could have many more pigs with such a saving. wink



Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Saturday 12th January 2019
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FredClogs said:
"Our Private Client services offers fully managed ISAs and Pensions (with SIPP commercial property functionality) without the added expense of platform and adviser fees"


Hi Nic,

Can you explain this, I have a sipp if I transfer my sipp investments to you are you saying they'll be no platform fees? How do you get paid?
Hi Fred

We offer managed ISA's and pensions with SIPP property functionality, not a SIPP whereby you can pick and choose from multiple investment types yourself.

If you are looking to self select/invest then HL have a great service track record, Fidelity are a giant having another go in the UK, ii have a fixed fee offering (if you want to simply buy and hold this works, if you want to trade regularly it doesn't).

Our full SIPPs are only available through regulated financial advisers.

Our total annual charge for a fully managed ISA/Pension (with SIPP commercial property functionality) is is 0.87%. This includes of all costs.

A platform would typically cost between 0.25% to 0.45% and adviser fees are typically 1% a year..

So without these fees you are already up to 1.45% ahead every year.




Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
Derek Chevalier said:
Intelligent Money said:
So without these fees you are already up to 1.45% ahead every year.

Think we need to be very clear we are comparing apples with apples, unlike our friends at HL

https://citywire.co.uk/new-model-adviser/news/were...

According to this, on a 250k SIPP, advice is 87bps, platform 28bps and you can get a global portfolio for 20bps, so around 135bps if you were happy with a passive approach.

https://citywire.co.uk/new-model-adviser/news/advi...

Of course, that's looking at raw numbers, and if you look at various studies (and this is apparent in the real world), an adviser (if they are half decent working with the right clients) should be able to cover his 87bps several times over, per year. Tangibles AND intangibles, in both accumulation and decumulation.
Saying that a half decent adviser should be able to cover his 87bps (0.87%) fees several time over ever year is a very bold statement indeed!

I've not seen any evidence that supports this.

The second article you link to makes very interesting reading:

Citywire said:
Exclusive New Model Adviser® research has found the average ongoing advice fee is going up. The average fee charged by New Model Adviser® Top 100 firms is 87 basis points (bps), a marked increase from the typical 50 bps advisers say was being charged at the time of the retail distribution review (RDR).

The average for the 54 firms was 87 bps for ongoing advice, with 21 of the advisers charging 100 bps. The average platform fee meanwhile was 28 bps and the average fund management charge was 63 bps, bringing the total average annual cost to clients to 178 bps.

‘The evidence is that advice fees are consistently going up. As much as we on the inside say they will come down, there is no evidence that this is happening at the moment. The normal metric of supply and demand suggests that is not going to carry on further forward. All the metrics suggest advice fees, if anything, could go higher.’
So whilst advisers could recommend a global portfolio for 20bps, the average fund charge was 63bps (0.63%) bringing the total average charge up to 1.78%.

In our experience this is still far lower than the average real word charges we see from advisers.

However, as a former financial adviser myself until I moved to IM, I am not in any way knocking the role an adviser plays.

Whilst clients are prepared to pay financial advisers for advice then they must be providing a valuable service, this stands to reason.

Equally, there are many people who don't want to pay for such advice (and/or do not trust financial advisers) and who are happy to save money by doing everything themselves. Fantastic.

What we offer is a middle ground. Everything is fully managed and you have access to a qualified and experienced account manager, yet at half the price of the average adviser solution in the article you linked to above.

This ideal for others.

So there is no right or wrong approach, just different approaches that suit different people.

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
Derek Chevalier said:
Intelligent Money said:
Saying that a half decent adviser should be able to cover his 87bps (0.87%) fees several time over ever year is a very bold statement indeed!

I've not seen any evidence that supports this.
If you look at Vanguard Adviser Alpha study they attempt to put some hard numbers against the areas where a (decent) adviser adds value. See also Royal London's "The value of financial advice", and while you could take these studies with a pinch of salt, in the real world it holds true (as I mentioned, for the right client (which is a whole new discussion!)).

It is a shame (although understandable) that a large percentage of people don't trust advisers.
Thanks Derek, I'll have a look at this.

I think we both know that good advisers (and I agree, with the right client) can add value, unfortunately it is often the case that they don't - and these are not the minority either.

I like to believe I did when I was practising and I am sure you do too.

We work with financial advisers every day and can see the disparity between the good and the bad quite clearly (and often depressingly). The bad drag down the good, to put it simply.

That is why we decide to launch Private Clients, as a viable alternative to advice at one end and DIY platforms at the other.

But as I have said, there is a place for each approach.

Regards

Nik

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
rockin said:
Intelligent Money said:
What we offer is a middle ground. Everything is fully managed and you have access to a qualified and experienced account manager, yet at half the price of the average adviser solution in the article you linked to above.
1. To clarify this question of costs, please illustrate the total charges paid by a new client who brings £100k to your firm with a 10 year investment horizon. If advice or anything else is an additional charge please make that clear and give an indication of cost. (This question is not about total charges levied by your firm, it's about total charges borne by the client, so includes fund management fees, any separate platform costs etc.)

2. If someone brings you £100k what do you use as the starting point to measure and report their investment return,
A. £100k?
or
B. £9,850k? (i.e. after your 1.5% initial charge)
Hello Steve

1. The 0.87% annual charge is inclusive of everything the client will pay. So (using round numbers) the cost in year 1 would be £870 and if the funds rise by an average of 7% a year then the total cost will rise by the same level.

The 0.87% includes:

  • Investment management
  • Underlying funds
  • Dealing fees
  • Custody
  • Rebalancing
  • ISA wrapper
  • Pension wrapper
  • Taking tax free cash from your pension
  • Income drawdown from your pension
  • Purchasing and holding a commercial property doesn't even carry an additional charge
  • Unlimited access to me and my Private Client team is also included

We don't provide advice, so there are no additional advice fees (unless you decide to appoint a third party adviser), we provide information, guidance and support to enable you to come to your own professionally informed decisions.

There is no platform fee either.

The 0.87% includes everything our Private Clients pay.


2. The starting point for investment returns on a £100,000 investment would be £98,500 for a general client and £100,000 for PHers.


I hope this fully answers your question.

Regards

Nik

BTW, for those that do not know, Intelligent Money is owned by a quite active PHer, hence the special terms for other PHers.



Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
FredClogs said:
"Our Private Client services offers fully managed ISAs and Pensions (with SIPP commercial property functionality) without the added expense of platform and adviser fees"


Hi Nic,

Can you explain this, I have a sipp if I transfer my sipp investments to you are you saying they'll be no platform fees? How do you get paid?
Hi Fred

I've just been going back through posts and don't think I quite addressed your question properly (and also missed a couple of others that I'll answer below).

If you transfer your SIPP investment to us we will then manage them on your behalf based upon your required approach. We charge a fully inclusive 0.87% a year for this and our other services.

There are no platform fees for our managed portfolios, or any other fees for that matter.

If you have a commercial property within your SIPP you can transfer this across too. There is no fee for this or the ongoing management of your commercial property/properties providing you have a minimum of £100k invested in our portfolios.

We get paid by our margin on your investment portfolios.

I hope this better addresses your question, please get back to me if there is anything else.

Regards

Nik


Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
Sorry Steve, I missed these:

rockin said:
Intelligent Money said:
I don't give or charge for financial advice - I just help my clients achieve their financial planning goals and act as their personal contact.
When Selmahoose punts his £100k in your direction there will be an initial charge of 1.5% - what does he get for his £1,500? And then the ongoing charge of 0.87% p.a. is double some other firms.

Bear in mind he could buy one-off allocation advice elsewhere and then invest in L&G trackers on a low cost platform for relative peanuts. You would have to "outperform" by 0.5% p.a. just to keep up with him.
Firstly, there wouldn't be any initial charge as Selmahoose is a PHer.

He could certainly buy trackers for peanuts but he would have to manage his asset allocation and rebalance this himself.

Alternatively he could pick a global tracker - if he is happy to have his holding blindly mirror their market capitalisation with no discretion to take into account economic, political or market sentiment at the time. We evaluate this daily.

Our Private Client proposition is basically saying pay a bit more than the absolute cheapest option (or a lot less than an advised option) for a fully managed service with full support.

As I have said before, it is not right or wrong, it is just an alternative to the advised/DIY models.


rockin said:
The concepts of "income" and "capital" are IMO a bit old-fashioned. For a market investor they are both just "making money" and, particularly in an ISA or SIPP, it doesn't much matter which is which. What does matter is your total return.

On the other hand a real estate investor whose "capital" is in large lumps bolted to the ground will be far more dependent upon his income yield. He has no other convenient way to access cash.

For most investors any distinction between income and capital only matters if and when the TaxMan says it matters!
We agree completely. We invest for 'returns'. How you choose to treat them is the only thing that defines whether it is growth or income.

You have summed up a conversation I regularly have with clients. beer

Regards

Nik

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
Ayahuasca said:
I see that some blue chip shares e.g. HSBC and Glaxo are yielding over 5% (latest dividend as a percentage of current share price). What is the likelihood of their dividend being maintained?
bhstewie said:
Nik,

What's your view on "dividend investing" v simply investing in good companies please?

I'm simplifying massively but the "any dog that pays 4%" v the Terry Smith point of view of buy good companies and take what you need when you need it.
Hi guys, I hope you don't mind that I have lumped these questions together as they are essentially the same thing.

I personally like dividend investing (or Equity Income) based upon the premise that companies often increase their dividend to attract investment when the share price falls and then reduce the dividend when the share price strengthens.

A good fund manager (or individual investor) is therefore able to buy value stock with high dividends and will sell this stock for a profit when the dividend falls. It's the best of both worlds. In theory.

Getting this right is a slightly different matter though!

William Littlewood pretty much gave a master class on this approach when he ran Jupiter Income (an equity fund).

So, what is the likelihood of current dividend yields being maintained? It depends on many things, individual corporate fundamentals, market sentiment, currency pricing (particularly for FTSE 100 companies), even politics and interest rates.

The best answer I can give (as I don't have a crystal ball) is to give you my personal thoughts and position. Would I adopt this investment approach? Yes, I both would and do. High dividends are a great bonus and an insurance against capital (share price) falls whilst still giving the potential for capital growth (albeit at a potential reduction in future dividend yield).

However, I would make this part of an investment strategy, not all of it. The foundations should be globally diverse holdings generating a mixture of growth and income from different asset classes. There is absolutely nothing wrong whatsoever by complimenting this with a high dividend (equity income) holding or a growth focused holding. Out of the two, I prefer the high dividend approach (but that does not make it better than the alternative!).

Great questions guys, please pick me up if I didn't answer it fully.

Regards

Nik

Intelligent Money

Original Poster:

506 posts

63 months

Sunday 13th January 2019
quotequote all
rockin said:
Intelligent Money said:
Our Private Client proposition is basically saying pay a bit more than the absolute cheapest option (or a lot less than an advised option) for a fully managed service with full support.
With total costs 0.87% it merits consideration as a middle road between the extremes of, say, 0.4% and 1.78%. You indicated that more performance history will be available next week and I think it will be interesting to see what emerges.

To my mind it's often easier for an investor to "save 1% p.a." by minimising what's spent on advice than it is to "make 1% p.a." by chasing additional investment return.
I wouldn't class 1.78% as an extreme. We regularly see advised models around the 3% per year mark.

I agree with your point though. We are not trying to be all things to all people. For some the DIY platform approach is best and for others the advised approach is the best. We offer a solution for those who sit between or are not comfortable with where the currently sit.

Our most popular portfolio (Global Growth) returned just shy of 10% annualised average return over the last 5 years to 30th September. Obviously market movements since then will impact on this, as is to be expected. These returns consisted of a 47% three year return and a 60% five year return.

I'll post the updated figures next week, together with the relevant (that is to say correct, not flattering) benchmark returns.

Regards

Nik
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