Financial News

The rules for inheriting ISAs will change from 6 April. It was announced by George Osborne in 2014 that ISAs would become inheritable by surviving spouses and civil partners. At the time, nobody – not even the Treasury – was clear what the then chancellor meant. The...

HMRC has published its annual assessment of the cost of tax reliefs. Every January HMRC publishes a table of ‘Estimated costs of principal tax reliefs’. Any Chancellor facing a budget deficit is bound to run his eyes down the list to see where the money is...

There will be no Spring Budget this March, but that does not mean the Chancellor is staying silent. On 13 March, the Chancellor will present a Spring Statement to the House of Commons, not a Budget. The next Budget should be in the autumn, probably November....

This is the time of year to review your pension contributions. February and March are rightly popular times for reviewing and making pension contributions. By this stage you should have a good idea of what your income for the tax year will be and how much...

Investors and their advisers should start to turn their focus to the end of the tax year on 5 April. ISA contributions have historically always been focused on the end of the tax year. This is the case even though it would make more sense to...

The world’s share markets were a profitable place to be in 2017. 2017 had its fair share of dramas. There was the unending reality show of Donald Trump and his tweets. On this side of the Atlantic the ongoing saga was Brexit and the “strong and...

Last month saw another Budget – for Scotland, this time.  The Scottish Budget in the middle of December contained potential omens for the whole of the UK with its proposed changes to income tax bands and thresholds. In the foreword to the main Budget document,...

The government has published a review on automatic enrolment in workplace pensions which makes important proposals for employers. Automatic enrolment of employees in workplace pensions has been a greater success than many predicted when it was introduced in October 2012. To date over nine million employees...

November marked the first rise in the Bank of England Base Rate in over ten years. At the start of November, the Bank of England raised its base rate for the first time since 5 July 2007. Just over a decade ago, the previous increase...