Anyone thinking of investing via Singapore?

[stogie bear]

Inflation only affects you if you spend money and the things you spend money on rise in price.

I don't.

Rent, taxis, hotels, sex, bills and food... same as I have paid for years... So inflation doesn't affect me... or it does, slightly (maybe) but there are easy ways around it.

Living here (Thailand) I don't pay any taxes in the UK on any savings so actually in real terms although my 'spending power' may be slightly hit my savings will go on growing as I have no intention of spending the money anyway! It'll just sit in the bank for years.

OK, 7% is good but there's no reason to think that will change in the short term so let's say 5 years...

A deposit of £50,000 initially...

A monthly deposit for 5 years of £1000 for an interest rate of 7.000 % compounded monthly...


0 £ 66,007.09
1 £ 83,171.33
2 £ 101,576.38
3 £ 121,311.93
4 £ 142,474.16

Final Savings Balance: £142,474.16

Basically you are making over £32,000 interest with that plan over 5 years...

I'm just wondering if the risk of UK based banks going under or investments collapsing or currencies changing, etc... I could do better elsewhere with a similar low to zero risk strategy...

I don't think I can, but then again I don't know much about the money business.

[katoeylover]

In the UK you are covered up to £50k on all deposits.

Maybe worth putting some elsewhere and have NO risk

[stogie bear]

That 50K must be a very recent change in the law... but it's welcome news!

[Tomcat]

I doubt if that will last long. This Govt wont be around after the next election and a lot of things are going to change in the next 10 years
. How can the Govt keep an open promise to bail out the banks. it cant .. period...

By Xmas there will have been some more big fallouts...I would opt for safety for the next 6 months. The Daily Telegraph has a very good supplement on saturday ...very good..

All the best deals are listed.

[PigDogg]

It may get really ugly out there. My equity position is net short, in other words I make money if the market goes down but lose if the market goes up. The trend is your friend.

[katoeylover]

(stogie bear @ Jul. 11 2008,16:52) That 50K must be a very recent change in the law... but it's welcome news!

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/07/...s/deposits.php

LONDON: Britain's chancellor of the exchequer, Alistair Darling, on Tuesday put off a plan to get banks in Britain to pay for a system that guarantees the deposits of savers, giving lenders time to recover from a global credit squeeze.

The Treasury said it planned to extend the guarantee on deposits in each British bank account to £50,000, or $99,660, short of previous suggestions that the system would cover double that amount.

The plan leaves taxpayers on the hook for the compensation to savers if a bank fails.

Opposition lawmakers said Darling bowed to pressure from lenders by not forcing them to pay into an insurance fund. The measures are aimed at preventing another run on deposits like the one at Northern Rock, whose customers lined up for three consecutive business days until Darling guaranteed savings on Sept. 17.

"The chancellor has clearly buckled," said Vince Cable, a legislator who speaks for the Liberal Democrats on Treasury matters. "If there is to be confidence in the banking system it is critical that there is rapid repayment. The only way this can happen is for the banks to make up-front payments."
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Cable also criticized Darling for not increasing the guarantee more. Darling said in September that he might back deposits of up to £100,000, saying he wanted other political parties to come to consensus with the Labour government on the matter.

The British Bankers' Association, which lobbies on behalf of banks, said it was wrong to focus on the amount that was guaranteed and that more work should go into preventing failures in the first place.

"We have been talking with the government and regulators about intervening earlier should a bank get into difficulties to prevent a banking problem becoming a crisis," the bankers' association said. "The U.K. has a strong and robust banking system and a depositor protection scheme which already protects fully some 96 percent of depositors."

Until the run on Northern Rock, the banking-industry-financed program paid back 100 percent of the first £2,000 of savings lost in a bank failure and 90 percent of deposits up to £33,000.

The Bank of England governor, Mervyn King, has said Britain's system is not generous enough to prevent a run on institutions that appear to be in trouble.

The protection plan is part of a broader package to underpin the financial system in times of crisis. The Treasury, the Bank of England and the Financial Services Authority - whose job is to oversee the banking system - said proposals published Tuesday would reduce the likelihood that banks would run into trouble in the future.

[stogie bear]

So, it's not law yet then...

[pacman]

(katoeylover @ Jul. 12 2008,12:14) .....the financial system in times of crisis. The Treasury, the Bank of England and the Financial Services Authority - whose job is to oversee the banking system - said proposals published Tuesday would reduce the likelihood that banks would run into trouble in the future.

The 3 of these know there are massive storm clouds on the financial horizon.

All 3 are aware that the banking system is going to be tested like never before in the history of the world.

There are going to be dramatic failures but who & when we can't foretell.

Is our money safe? I hope so but if it turns really bad then we can't expect the Govt to save us.

Care to disagree? ... fine, but lets re-visit this in a year or two & see who's right.

I have no economics degree, am not a bank executive, am not a Treasury official, but those guys would be the last people wanting to warn us.

I am just a keen student of the current disaster overwhelming world financial markets & when every analyst is warning of the same thing, I don't see much point denying them.

[Tomcat]

(pacman @ Jul. 12 2008,13:16) but lets re-visit this in a year or two & see who's right.

There is no right and wrong on these matters only judgement. If anyone could 100% predict even just a small movement they would be smoking havanas by wednesday...

IMO
the next big thing will be Robotics and many billions are about to made....just like the Internet took off this is just happening now as computer processing power is cheap enough to run these projects

Once i find the right channel ill certainly be slotting myself in..$$$