Taxation

Proposals on Limiting ISAs

The views expressed in this article are those of its author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc. The Resolution Foundation has released a report looking at “the Government’s policies to encourage household saving”, it particularly focuses on ISAs and notes that capping ISAs could raise £1bn in tax for the Treasury.   https://www.resolutionfoundation.org/publications/isa-isa-baby/  The report proposes a cap on ISAs of £100k but is unclear if that’s a cap on total contributions or a cap on the total value of an ISA.  At one point ...

Interest Rate Sanity and Chancellor’s Announcements

The views expressed in this article are those of its author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc. The Bank of England’s announcement of an increase in base rate to 2.25% was just one step in a return to sanity. With inflation nearing 10% why would any idiot lend money at 5% or less as many mortgage providers have been doing. In reality the last few years have seen lower interest rates than have been available for the last 5,000 years. This has been ...

Mini Budget – Good but misses a chance

This article represents the views of its author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc. The Chancellor has taken steps  to drive forward the Government’s desire to simplify the personal tax system for individuals. This has included the removal of a new tax charge (the Health and Social Care Levy), the removal of an income tax bracket (the additional 45% tax rate) and the reversal of the 1.25% increase to dividend tax rates from April 2023. However, in his Statement on Thursday the Chancellor ...

It’s a Prosecco & Cava Budget

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc. It’s a sparkling wine budget – or at least one to celebrate for investors as there are no really negative changes in it that were widely rumoured. At least that is apart from the rise in dividend taxes and freezing of allowances previously announced. Here’s a list of the key points: The National Living Wage is being increased. The Government is substantially increasing funding for R&D.  ...

Good Articles in Investors’ Chronicle

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily those of ShareSoc There were several good articles in this week’s Investors’ Chronicle. I cover them briefly below. The Editor, Rosie Carr, reported on feedback on readers’ views on taxation. Should the wealthy readers of the IC pay more was one question previously posed and the consensus answer seemed to be Yes. For pensioners it was suggested that they should pay National Insurance on their income and that there ...

How Wealthy Americans Pay No Tax

This article expresses the personal views of its author, not necessarily those of ShareSoc. There was another article in the Financial Times today covering “How the wealthiest Americans get away with paying no tax”. The item was based on a report by ProPublica which suggested that America’s richest billionaires paid virtually no taxes on hundreds of billions of dollars of added wealth over the past decade. They only paid 3.4% of the increase in taxes. The report is based on leaked IRS ...

Capital Gains Tax Review – Is It Simplification, or Is There a Hidden Agenda?

The Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) have published a second report on Capital Gains Tax covering practical, administrative and technical issues. They give a number of recommendations to the Government and I cover those that may affect individual investors below (at least the few who actually pay capital gains tax) and add a few comments: HMRC should integrate the different ways of reporting and paying Capital Gains Tax into the Single Customer Account, making it a central hub for reporting and ...

Modernisation of Stamp Duty

HMRC have announced a “Call for Evidence” on the “Modernisation of Stamp Taxes on Shares Framework”. If you deal mainly in the shares of public companies you may not know much about this subject – I certainly don’t. But the consultation document is very enlightening – see link below. That’s if you can understand it because this tax seems to be like capital gains tax – horribly complicated as it has been built up over many years and with a large ...

Capital Gains Tax Reform? Surely Long Overdue

CGT Review Last week the Office of Tax Simplification (OTS) announced a review of Capital Gains Tax. They have invited evidence and there is a simple on-line survey you can complete on the subject (see link below). As someone who occasionally pays capital gains tax, I give you my views on the subject below. It is of course a horribly complex tax with several different rates and numerous exemptions. I need to employ an accountant to work out my self-assessment tax returns when ...

Taking Cash From ISAs and IHT Reclaims

If like me you have been selling shares in your ISA during the market crash, you may now have a lot of cash sitting idle in your ISA. Most brokers pay no interest to you on it but prefer to collect it themselves. But now we are into the new tax year, there is a solution to this. Take the cash out and put it on deposit into a high interest current account. You will get over 1% interest. You can put ...