Money Management articles from August 2004

Money Management archives from August 2004

Fantasy portfolio challenge.
August 1, 2004... SELECTED PORTFOLIOS, listed with the financial services sector portal Ample, which is sponsoring the FPC contest, began trading on 1 July. The contest will last 12 months. Emerging markets and small caps is the dominant theme in the FPC...

MI5.
August 1, 2004... Merchant Investors claimed the third annual Money Management Finance Fives title, comprehensively beating last year's winners, the Children's Mutual, 2-0 in the final. 14 teams from organisations as diverse as Standard & Poor's, Rowan and...

Divorce service thriving on happy relationships.
August 1, 2004... Breaking up is hard to do but one IFA is seeking to make it less financially traumatic for clients getting divorced. Alexander James Financial Services, an IFA based in Wolverhampton, established the Divorce Bureau late last year in an...

A blast from the past.
August 1, 2004... In August 1979 Money Management covered the year's second Budget, a result of the Conservative victory in the general election that brought Margaret Thatcher to power. It was unveiled on Tuesday 12 June by Sir Geoffrey Howe, the Chancellor of...

bond return.
August 1, 2004... It started out as International Life Insurance. Then it changed hands and traded as Cannon Assurance. When its present owners bought it, it traded as Cannon Lincoln. In its latest incarnation -- as Lincoln -- the insurance company is entering...

tempting the wary.
August 1, 2004... Structured product specialist Nvesta has added a new FTSE 100 tracker to its range of offerings. The Secure Tracker Plan 5 boasts 107.5% participation in the FTSE 100 over a six year term and 100% capital protection at maturity. It also...

flexible friend for high earners.
August 1, 2004... Scottish Equitable International has unveiled a new offshore investment plan that claims to offer a high level of flexibility. The Flexible Investment Plan, the fourth Dublin-based offering from the company, features an option to make regular...

completely abbey.
August 1, 2004... Abbey has launched an offshore bond, available exclusively through its wrap. The bond can be set up on a life assurance or redemption basis and has no predetermined requirements on any lives assured. This means that no information is needed on...

Number crunching.
August 1, 2004... Back in the early 90s, I was asked by the then regulators, LAUTRO, to attend a meeting at their offices "to discuss projections". But it turned out that the meeting was really to try to persuade me to stop publishing tables of own charges...

reality strikes.
August 1, 2004... The regulatory regime governing life offices' capital adequacy, and with profits offices in particular, is in transition. In 2003, the FSA consulted on the assessment and setting of capital requirements for life insurers (CP 195), and on...

hedge fund on a budget.
August 1, 2004... Last month's MM saw the launch of a fund of hedge funds with a minimum investment of just AGBP10,000. Such a low minimum investment for hedge funds is almost unprecedented. But this month brings news of a hedge product with a minimum investment...

Residential property and pensions.
August 1, 2004... Property investments for pension funds has always been limited to commercial property in the past. But now the Government is proposing property investment funds (PIFs) with a significant residential property element. More dramatically the...

Will PMI die?
August 1, 2004... Few IFAs anxiously awaited the keynote speech at this year's British Medical Association conference in north Wales. The leader of the professional body for doctors, James Johnson, does not set premiums, regulate business practices or devise...

No contest.
August 1, 2004... The pensions crisis, the savings gap, the seemingly unending run of misselling scandals and a host of underperforming products, from splits to endowments to precipice bonds, have led to the financial services industry's reputation suffering...

is credit card spending an anathema to a saving culture?
August 1, 2004... Increased longevity and lower birth rates mean that pensions are a huge problem for most countries. Under Mrs Thatcher, Treasury officials, including the young David Willetts MP, woke up to the huge demographic threat to the Exchequer and...

adapting, but not to survive.
August 1, 2004... Zurich has launched a whole of life plan designed to counter any liability to inheritance tax. The Adaptable Life Plan features no investment element and is available on a single life, joint life first death and joint life second death basis....

Taking STOCK - August.
August 1, 2004... Mr Roberts is not the first investor, and nor will he be the last, to discover that investment panaceas are never as simple as we would like them to be. Indeed, if asset allocation is to be effective, both investor and adviser need to work...

Under ir35 - carry on regardless?
August 1, 2004... The IR35 rules apply where an individual (known as a worker) provides services to another person (known as the client) under arrangements involving an intermediary (such as a company or partnership), in circum-stances such that if the contract...

Commission impossible.
August 1, 2004... The FSA's own Complaints Commission has come under scrutiny after repeatedly finding against the regulator. Despite berating the watchdog for its failure to properly service IFAs' needs through several recent crises, the Commissioner does not...

the new generation of with profits.
August 1, 2004... The new millennium has been characterised by lower investment returns, which have had a dramatic impact on investor confidence and expectations. The financial services industry has realised that, in hindsight, it could have done a much better...

BBB mis-selling claims date from Berry's tenure.
August 1, 2004... Thousands of records that prove whether clients of Berkeley Berry Birch were mis-sold mortgage endowments were not maintained after the regulatory period for keeping the documents had elapsed. The management team that presided over the loss...

FSA offers concession.
August 1, 2004... Proposals for a more risk-based approach to the calculation of capital requirements have been published by the FSA. The proposals, to come into force from the end of this year, are effectively a partial watering down of the requirements...

Myners digging for mutuals feedback.
August 1, 2004... The Myners review of the mutual life sector is to call for stricter rules on corporate governance to avoid a repeat of the Equitable Life debacle. The treasury-commissioned consultation on corporate governance in the mutual life and wider...

Ombudsman role to be reviewed.
August 1, 2004... Consultation proposals aiming to improve the handling of "wider implications" FOS cases have been unveiled by the regulator. The proposals, part of the ongoing two year review of the Financial Services and Markets Act, are primarily...

Why the pass don't work.
August 1, 2004... IFA quotes and new business portal Webline cancelled its deal with standards-setting body Origo that allowed advisers to access the website using Unipass because the portal's management is worried about security. Unipass was set up by...

Extending homes.
August 1, 2004... Strong house price growth has undoubtedly helped contribute to the rise of the buy-to-let sector. Figures from the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) show that the sector has increased its share of the mortgage market from 2% in 1999 to 9% in...

Government prepares for retirement at 70.
August 1, 2004... A little noticed Government target to increase life expectancy by three years for men and by two and a half years for women by 2010, increases the likelihood that ministers will lift the retirement age for company pension schemes to 70. ...

More awards for MM.
August 1, 2004... We are delighted to announce that Money Management has won two runners up prizes in this year's Aon Consulting pension and investment journalist awards. Nicole Pedersen-McKinnon, deputy editor, was runner up in the technical writer's...