Investing | Ross Naylor

Are Premium Bonds a good investment?

I was tidying my documents the other day and came across an old Premium Bond certificate that I received as a gift around the time that I was born. With fingers firmly crossed I checked the website to see if I was a lucky winner, and…… I wasn’t. Which means that in the past 46 years that I have held them, I have won absolutely nothing in Premium Bond prizes.

The Basics of Good Expat Investment Advice

Historically, expat investment advice has been characterised by the focus on the sale of a financial product, e.g. a pension plan or an investment fund. While products are, obviously, a necessary feature of a wider holistic financial planning strategy, good quality expat investment and retirement advice encompasses much more than simply selling products.

If it is too good to be true… How to learn from past investment scams

There was a story on the BBC website last week about a couple who invested their pension fund in a firm producing truffle trees; not surprisingly, the story didn’t end happily. The story reminded me of a similar incident involving the equally exotic Quadris Environmental Forestry Fund. This fund, which was launched in 2001 and was managed by a company called Floresteca, invested into teak plantations in Brazil. In total, they invested more than GBP100 million from 1,200 people

Do you remember the first iPhone?

The first iPhone was released over a decade ago (June 2007). Do you remember it? Painfully slow web browsing, no video camera, no selfies. No selfies! How on earth did we live? Now compare it to the current iPhone 13. Quite a difference, right There is a neat comparison to be made between the evolution of the iPhone and that of investment products for expats.