[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images I think investors with a long-term focus should be looking carefully at UK shares right now. To my mind, the relative discount on offer at the moment is huge. One way of looking at how attractive share prices are is by comparing them with bonds. And when it comes to the FTSE 100, I think the difference is quite striking. Stocks vs bonds In general, stocks offer more potential reward at the cost of higher risk. A bond return can’t go up, but a government defaulting on its debts is less likely than a company…
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[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images I’ve had some big winners and some big losers in my Stocks and Shares ISA in 2025. And I’m in the process of figuring out my strategy for 2026. The big question is what I should do with my less successful investments. Should I double down on them, or cut them loose to focus on ones that have been working well? Underperformers The overall performance of my Stocks and Shares ISA this year has been held back by a few stocks that have fared very badly in 2025. These include the likes of Bunzl and …
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images What’s not to like about passive income? The concept of earning money for doing very little certainly appeals to me. And with the State Pension currently around 30% of average earnings — and the age at which people qualify likely to increase further — I think it’s never too late to start looking at dividend shares. But how many are needed to have a decent retirement? Some important numbers According to Pensions UK, a single person needs £43,900 a year (£3,658 a month) to live comfortably in old age. To achieve this, a portfolio of…
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images The Autumn Budget’s changes to the Cash ISA limit mean anyone thinking about passive income may need to rethink their strategy. I ran the numbers to see how big an ISA pot someone would need to target a £16,000 yearly income – that’s £1,333 a month. Could this be achievable with a typical savings plan? Crunching the numbers Using the classic 4% rule, an ISA pot of around £400,000 could hypothetically generate £16,000 a year in passive income – a useful benchmark for thinking about the size of the pot needed. So how much might…
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images Lloyds (LSE:LLOY) shares have been enormously popular with dividend investors down the years. Can they still claim to a top Buy for passive income, though? I’m not so sure. At 94.3p, Lloyds’ share price has rocketed 72% since 1 January. As a result, dividend yields on the FTSE 100 bank have collapsed below the long-term average. That’s not the only worry I have as a stock market investor myself. Is Lloyds a dividend share investors need to think about avoiding today? Great qualities What makes retail banks like this such popular dividend stocks in the…
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images The FTSE 100 index of stocks is well and truly back, delivering a stunning 21.4% total return over the past year. If you’d put £20,000 in an index tracker fund last December, you’d now be sitting on a cool £24,280. Those who’d invested more would have naturally made an even greater pile of cash, and certainly more than putting money in an S&P 500 fund. This US share index has delivered a weaker (if still pretty decent) 14.6% return during the last 12 months. But can the FTSE 100 continue its stunning recent form? Top…
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images Not surprisingly, when I asked ChatGPT to come up with the ‘ultimate’ income stock, the software pointed out that there isn’t a single dividend share that will suit everyone. Instead, it said there are plenty of candidates to choose from and that it’s necessary to consider the history, consistency and sustainability of payouts. When pushed to give me the names of some of these companies it warned that the list did not comprise recommendations but “classic examples of stable, dependable dividend payers”. What did it say? The software pointed out that Procter & Gamble and…
[ad_1] The question of whether quarterly earnings reporting helps or harms long-term value creation has returned to the US policy agenda. As a former fund manager, I can appreciate the appeal, but as someone who currently spends her days analyzing investor decision-making data, I see the implications of a shift to semi-annual reporting as far broader than the familiar short-termism argument suggests. Reducing the cadence of earnings releases would amount to a major behavioral intervention in how market practitioners learn, recalibrate, and compete. While proponents argue that quarterly disclosure causes both companies and investors to fixate on short-term results (McKinsey…
[ad_1] Image source: Getty Images The BP (LSE: BP) share price has had an okay run in 2025. Nothing special, it’s up a modest 12%, but not too shabby either, especially after adding the 5.5% trailing dividend yield. Performance looked better a month ago, but the shares have sagged 7% since then, and as someone who holds the stock, I’ve got the uneasy feeling that there’s a lot more trouble to come in 2026. In fact, I’m worried BP is in for a proper battering. It wouldn’t be the first time. The Deepwater Horizon tragedy in 2010 cast a pall…
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