Category Archives: Strategy

Mortgage freedom

By gameplan | Published: February 21, 2010
I am facing a dilemma. Should I pay off my mortgage or not? First the facts.  I am 46 years old.  I have an offset “tracker” mortgage that allows a savings balance to be held against mortgage debt, providing absolute flexibility in terms of “overpayments”.  It also allows payment holidays.  My house is (still) worth over £300,000. [...]
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Win by doing nothing

By gameplan | Published: February 13, 2010
Note to self:- only act when trend information dictates, not to make myself feel better by tinkering with my SIPP portfolio!
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The fallacy of buy and hold

By gameplan | Published: December 6, 2009
It doesn't take expensive investment management experts to improve your investment performance dramatically. You can do this yourself using simple moving averages! It is less risky than investing and hoping.
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A load of BULL

By gameplan | Published: December 5, 2009
Here is another great idea for a different type of investment for your retirement account or SIPP - commodity ETFs
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Take control

By gameplan | Published: November 22, 2009
I love managing my own money, so, when self-select SIPPs came on the market a few years back, I knew immediately that I wanted one. I am also lucky that, at work, I can manage the contributions into pension scheme between a (limited) selection of ETFs. So, for example, the bulk of my contributions are [...]
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Investing in Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs)

By gameplan | Published: April 5, 2008
Here is a really good article summarising  the strenths and weaknesses of Investing in Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs). A further advantage for UK based readers is that there is no stamp duty (transaction tax) to pay when you buy an ETF. 
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Why invest in a pension…..

By gameplan | Published: March 20, 2008
One thing is for sure, you will not have a decent quality of life on the state pension.  This means that you need to make some provision for the period of time between giving up work and the inevitable “shuffling off the mortal coil” as Monty Python would put it….. Luckily I have 16 years worth of final [...]
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Stop Losses

By gameplan | Published: March 2, 2008
One of the key features of trend following strategies is that you should let winning trends run and run.  Never cut them until the trend turns.  The trouble is that if you were to wait for moving average sell signals you may be very late getting out and have thrown away a considerable portion of your [...]
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Shorting with ETFs

By gameplan | Published: February 16, 2008
I have just come across ETFs that are linked to the reverse of an index performance, giving the investor the opportunity to go short.  These ETFs are from Deutche Bank’s ETF arm, DB X-Trackers, and there are three different short funds:- S&P 500 DAX Eurostoxx 50 I haven’t bought any ETFs from DB x-trackers yet but I am highly [...]
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Strategy – choice of markets

By gameplan | Published: January 6, 2008
Here is a little more on my strategy:-  My current portfolio consists entirely of Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) for the following reasons:- They are cheap (Total expense ratio far less than Investment Trusts or Unit Trusts) You don’t pay stamp duty when you buy them (keeps costs to a minimum) I can get exposure to a wide range of global markets I [...]
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