Investing philosophy – Page 5

Nov ’23 revalues the future

2023-12-052023-12-05 FIRE v LondonLeave a comment

In the news

It has been quite a busy month out there.

The Israel/Gaza crisis continues. Public opinion is shifting against the Israel government here, even in North London – which would normally be one of the most sympathetic neighbourhoods outside Tel Aviv.

The Ukrainians are left feeling somewhat zero-sum in the battle with Israel for foreign support and attention. Some informed opinion now says the war is over, bar the fighting, and the only thing left is a land-for-peace deal. And the USA election, which is still almost a year away. Sigh.

*How military control of Ukraine has changed since the full-scale invasion*

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Feeling broke

2023-10-242023-10-29 FIRE v London28 Comments

My psychology around money has changed significantly over the last two years. While some of that is captured in my monthly portfolio updates, I thought it was worth recording some of my emotions while they are still fresh.

Two years ago

Turning the clock back, my financial situation was, in word, ‘flush’. The stock market boom had just crested – S&P500 was at 4400, FTSE-100 was at 7000.

I generally had a surfeit of cash every month, just from earnings – never mind investment income. I saw several exits over a 2 year period in my angel investing activities. I reinvested both sheltered income and unsheltered income for compound investment growth. I was unmortgaged. Base rates were almost zero – which I exploited with a margin loan – leveraging my portfolio by a target 12% loan-to-value.

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The richest person you know

2023-06-18 FIRE v London21 Comments

What’s it like to be in the top 1%?

According to the statistics, most of the readers of my blog are among the highest earning and/or richest people in the UK.

I bet however that not many of you feel that way.

Let’s start with income

To be in the top 1% of earnings in the UK in 2019 required pre-tax earnings of at least £134k. To be in the top 10%, you need to earn (individually) about £54k. By 2023, inflation has probably increased all these numbers by at least 10%, to say £150k and £60k.