Article by Phil
Your IFA near me at Christina Clegg bring you a roundup of the financial news from March 2023:
- The Pension Regulator has started to crack down on pension funds who haven’t reported their ESG (Environmental, Sustainable Governance) credentials. Pension Schemes with over 100 members need to produce a statement of investment principles, including ESG. Pension Funds with over £1 billion is assets must also produce a climate change impact report every 12 months.
- The FCA has issued a warning about Spring Well Bank. This is not authorised and people should beware of any adverts promoting the Bank. Always check the FCA register for any IFA near me searches, it’s better to be safe than sorry.
- St James Place pre-tax profits have risen to over £400 million
- At the same time rebranded Abrdn announced that it had lost £615 million last year.
- House prices increased by 20% over the last three years (including the pandemic). In comparison to 8% in the three years before that.
- Assets under management at Schroders fell last by 4% to just over £700 billion.
- The government has announced that the Pensions Dashboard project will be delayed beyond its 31st August implementation date. No new date has been set.
- The number of ESG funds in Europe grew by almost 100% last year.
- An extra 100,000 people are now paying higher rate tax. That takes the total to just over 4 million people paying 40% tax. The highest taxes in the UK for 70 years.
- A report into divorce settlements in the UK revealed that shared pension orders were issued in only 15% of divorce cases.
- Consumer savings website Moneyfacts has re-branded itself to co.uk which is useful for comparing credit card and loan rates etc. They could also help you find an IFA near me.
- The Economic Crime Levy (ECL) will come into force in July. This is a new charge by the FCA to help tackle money laundering. Luckily it will only be paid by firms with revenues over £10 million, so most smaller advice firms like ours won’t have to pay the levy.
- The top 3 Banks for fraud helpline searches are Santander, Nat West and Barclays.
- 90,000 people who had retired have now re-joined the UK workforce.
- The Chancellor announced that income from cryptocurrency had to be declared as part of self-assessment tax returns.
- 23% of people say that they have stopped or cut their pension contributions this year.
- The Bank of England Base Rate increased again (23/3). This time to 4.25%
- The Consumer price Index rose to 10.4% in February
