What to do with €52,000.

dakan

Hi Folks,

I'm looking for some advise on what to do with €52,000 lying in a Permanent TSB a/c. It used to be in Northern Rock and I was getting 3.25% interest. Despite initial promises that the rate would stay the same when P.TSB took over from NR, the rate has now dropped to 2.75%.

I would like to invest it somewhere that is 'no' to 'low' risk and I would likely be in as position to add €2000 every 3 months.

Thanks for any advise.
Dakan.

DarkDusk

dakan wrote: »

Hi Folks,

I'm looking for some advise on what to do with €52,000 lying in a Permanent TSB a/c. It used to be in Northern Rock and I was getting 3.25% interest. Despite initial promises that the rate would stay the same when P.TSB took over from NR, the rate has now dropped to 2.75%.

I would like to invest it somewhere that is 'no' to 'low' risk and I would likely be in as position to add €2000 every 3 months.

Thanks for any advise.
Dakan.

Having a large savings denominated in euros is risky in these times, imo. The Swiss franc is a much safer currency, you should try and look into having your savings based there. If Greece defaults (which will eventually happen), the Spanish will do a run on the banks (followed by Portugal and the rest of the eu, including us!), and the euro will collapse, a splitting of the currency being the best case scenario. In this case, the buying power of your euros will drop dramatically (inflation). The Swiss have a very stable currency, they are currently trying to devalue it to keep their exports competitive.

A New earth

Can get 3.5% pa (equates to 5% on other deposits as DIRT free) on Savings Certs, 5.5 year term but can cash in anytime (with reduction in interest rate - should only cash in at end of a six month period after interest is added)
Ignores currency risk of course.

Roonbox

Buy physical Silver when the price collapses in the next year and you will not regret it in 4 years time

enda1

Highly diversified global portfolio. Speak to a financial broker.

Cavehill Red

Roonbox wrote: »

Buy physical Silver when the price collapses in the next year and you will not regret it in 4 years time

Why do you believe the price of physical silver will collapse, when it has already decoupled from the listed market price?

enda1

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Why do you believe the price of physical silver will collapse, when it has already decoupled from the listed market price?

OP asked for low to zero risk so he must be trolling or have misread.

Roonbox

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Why do you believe the price of physical silver will collapse, when it has already decoupled from the listed market price?

I think physical and paper will both have a significant drop in the next 18 months.

Along with almost everything.

Cavehill Red

Roonbox wrote: »

I think physical and paper will both have a significant drop in the next 18 months.

Along with almost everything.

There is never a scenario where everything falls in value at once. There's always a safe haven, even if it is bullion, or bullets, or whiskey, or petrol.
Care to present your rationale for a bullion collapse in the next 18 months, especially relating to silver (currently trading at a two-month low)?

Roonbox

Cavehill Red wrote: »

There is never a scenario where everything falls in value at once. There's always a safe haven, even if it is bullion, or bullets, or whiskey, or petrol.
Care to present your rationale for a bullion collapse in the next 18 months, especially relating to silver (currently trading at a two-month low)?

I should have been more clear..

I see Stock falling, Commodities Falling, the dollar Index & Bonds rising..

Basically Sept '08 to Mar '09.

Roonbox

enda1 wrote: »

OP asked for low to zero risk so he must be trolling or have misread.

Saving your funds in a Bank with a central Bank that prints on this scale is certainly more of a risk than holding hard assets.

Cute Hoor

There is probably no such thing as 'no risk', but if you are looking for 'no/low' risk I would suggest National Solidarity Bond (10 year returns 50% gross, 4 year returns 15% gross) or Savings Certificates (5.5 years returns 21% tax free), both from An Post. I would doubt that you will get better rates (tax free) from any other financial institution.

Other than that I would suggest investing in a small basket of blue chip stocks that pay a good dividend (a little bit risky but you would be hoping for capital appreciation as well as getting the annual return by way of dividend).

As for investing in a foreign institution (such as a Swiss bank), well you are immediately factoring in the vagaries of your selected currency, and tbh I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole with such a (relatively) small amount. The Swiss Franc has swung between 1.37 and 1.07 since the beginning of 2011, that's close to a 30% swing, who knows what's going to happen to it after one had invested in it.

As for the Euro going belly-up, well I just can't see it happen, it can't be let happen imo, the world financial system would collapse with it. Just think of the practicalities. Millions of IT man years went into preparing IT systems across the world for the launch of the Euro, with years to prepare and implement in a structured way, it would take longer to prepare IT systems for it's dissolution, if it happened overnight (which it would have to do to prevent currency manipulation) every financial IT system in the world would collapse. What would happen with the ATM's. There are probably millions of artic trucks traversing Germany at any moment in time, ferrying European (and all other continents as well) goods east to west, north to south, what would happen to these if the Euro collapsed overnight. The Euro is and was an imperfect concept, but in my view we are now stuck with it for better or worse and the powers that be will have to make it work.

Not sure about the commodities, I'll leave that to others.

All of the above is just my view of course, and it's impossible to accurately predict what's going to happen worldwide during your investment period, so you'll have to go with what you think is safest for you at the end of the day.

You could consider blowing it of course and save yourself the hassle and worry of what to do with it.

Best of luck with it.

Jim2007

DarkDusk wrote: »

The Swiss have a very stable currency, they are currently trying to devalue it to keep their exports competitive.

We're not trying to devalue it, we HAVE devalued it and a serious cost to many foreigners who have deposited their funds in our banks.... We will continue to hold that peg for the future and may even push it down further should it continue to be an issue - a strong Franc is not the objective!

And this peg has come at an awful cost - at last count (July) we now hold euro government bonds equal to the annual deficit of the latest 5 EU nations!

I see no merit in the Franc as a safe currency, given our dependency on the Euro...

JustAThought

Ever a better time to buy a cheep house - but then again you'll be taxed on that now .

Split it into 4 units of e10,000 & put it into An Post certs at 50% return over 10 years & a bit. If you need a quick 10k you won't loose the interest on the lot.

& 2 1/2 k to get the * out of this country.

A great investment each way.

DarkDusk

Cute Hoor wrote: »

As for the Euro going belly-up, well I just can't see it happen, it can't be let happen imo, the world financial system would collapse with it. Just think of the practicalities. Millions of IT man years went into preparing IT systems across the world for the launch of the Euro, with years to prepare and implement in a structured way, it would take longer to prepare IT systems for it's dissolution, if it happened overnight (which it would have to do to prevent currency manipulation) every financial IT system in the world would collapse. What would happen with the ATM's. There are probably millions of artic trucks traversing Germany at any moment in time, ferrying European (and all other continents as well) goods east to west, north to south, what would happen to these if the Euro collapsed overnight. The Euro is and was an imperfect concept, but in my view we are now stuck with it for better or worse and the powers that be will have to make it work.

Time will tell, I guess.

Cavehill Red

Roonbox wrote: »

I should have been more clear..

I see Stock falling, Commodities Falling, the dollar Index & Bonds rising..

Basically Sept '08 to Mar '09.

Don't want to drag this thread off-topic, but I'm curious as to the rationale for this analysis.

dakan

Hi everybody, thanks for the advise, you've given me a lot to look into.

But....

enda1 wrote: »

OP asked for low to zero risk so he must be trolling or have misread.

Just because someone asks a question about something they don't know a huge amount about, does not mean they are trolling. By low to no risk, I simply meant that I didn't want to invest in anything high risk that would need to be closely watched everyday.

enda1

dakan wrote: »

Hi everybody, thanks for the advise, you've given me a lot to look into.

But....

Just because someone asks a question about something they don't know a huge amount about, does not mean they are trolling. By low to no risk, I simply meant that I didn't want to invest in anything high risk that would need to be closely watched everyday.

Sorry! By "he" I was referring to the "buy silver it couldn't possibly go wrong" guy and not you.

Yours was an interesting question I think cause it's the most difficult one probably in the preset climate.

Roonbox

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Don't want to drag this thread off-topic, but I'm curious as to the rationale for this analysis.

In a very simplified form...

We have a world wide economic slowdown taking place now(Europe and the U.S especially) and China has slowed a lot in recent months also.

Each round of QE in the U.S has had less effect than the one beforehand and since the most recent "QEfinity" the FED has essentially shot all their bullets..

When we have a slowdown again, as has always happened every 4 - 6 years, their will be major difficulties as the FED cannot quadrouple the balance sheet again.

European countries that are bankrupt will eventually have to face reality also.

You can protect yourself in hard assets.

Liam

Roonbox

enda1 wrote: »

Sorry! By "he" I was referring to the "buy silver it couldn't possibly go wrong" guy and not you.

Yours was an interesting question I think cause it's the most difficult one probably in the preset climate.

I should cover myself by saying that this is obviously only my opinion.

And nothing is ever guaranteed.

DarkDusk

Why is there people opposed to investing in gold and silver? Precious metals have proven that they can maintain their value for thousands of years. Are they suddenly going to lose their value now? When investing in some asset, it is very unwise to value it in a certain currency only e.g. Euros. You forget that euros, dollars, yen ALL CURRENCIES are losing their value because of quantitative easing. Gold and silver have the job of keeping up with the money supply, and they've done a good job so far. You can print euros but you can't print silver.
However, please don't invest in paper gold/silver, that is very foolish and the paper market could crash any day now. Physical gold and silver are gradually diverging from the paper price. If the paper market crashes, imagine the amount of people who will be looking for their physical gold! Germany are currently looking for their gold, an audit is requested of their stock in Bank of England and the Fed. If the audit is carried out and Germany find out that the Fed has leased all their gold, all hell will break loose. Germany will be forced to buy on the open market, what will that do to the price of gold and silver? This is happening all over the world as countries wake up to the fact that fiat currencies (which are not money, just currencies) are losing their value and a new monetary system is on the horizon, which will have some backing.
Price the asset you want to invest in in property, land, oil, food, stocks, precious metals and then you will see the true value of the asset. If you are holding onto an asset for the long term, when you want to sell it there is no guarantee that it will be priced in the currency you bought it in. I'll say it again, you cannot see the true value of something by just looking at it's price in currency, it is misleading and will probably end in loss in your investment.

Ulster Bank offers 3.75% for a year OP. Probably one of the better deposit rates for a year around

dakan

enda1 wrote: »

Sorry! By "he" I was referring to the "buy silver it couldn't possibly go wrong" guy and not you.

Yours was an interesting question I think cause it's the most difficult one probably in the preset climate.

No probs enda1, sometimes people just seem to want to have a go at you for asking a question.

sink_or_swim

dakan wrote: »

Hi Folks,

I'm looking for some advise on what to do with €52,000 lying in a Permanent TSB a/c. It used to be in Northern Rock and I was getting 3.25% interest. Despite initial promises that the rate would stay the same when P.TSB took over from NR, the rate has now dropped to 2.75%.

I would like to invest it somewhere that is 'no' to 'low' risk and I would likely be in as position to add €2000 every 3 months.

Thanks for any advise.
Dakan.

your unlikely to get a better return than what you are presently getting in a savings account with irish banks , even bonds ( which pay less than most irish banks ) have some risk

the best way to reduce risk is a willingness to put away your money for a very long time , im talking at least fifteen years , historically speaking , stocks give a return of 10% per anum , since 2000 , they have not even returned a third of that but from 1980 to the year 2000 , they returned much more , so over a thirty year period , the rewards were generous

i would suggest putting your money in a global index etf fund which tracks the s + p in america , europe and emerging markets

vanguard are the cheapest but your assetts will be in dollars
ishares ( blackrock ) are slightly more expensive but you can buy one which is denominated in euro

you should recieve a dividend of at least 3% per year on any of those funds while you wait for growth

you will need to open an account with a stockbroker , i would recomend td waterhouse , the irish based stockbrokers are a rip off when it comes to fees

DarkDusk

sink_or_swim wrote: »

your unlikely to get a better return than what you are presently getting in a savings account with irish banks , even bonds ( which pay less than most irish banks ) have some risk

the best way to reduce risk is a willingness to put away your money for a very long time , im talking at least fifteen years , historically speaking , stocks give a return of 10% per anum , since 2000 , they have not even returned a third of that but from 1980 to the year 2000 , they returned much more , so over a thirty year period , the rewards were generous

i would suggest putting your money in a global index etf fund which tracks the s + p in america , europe and emerging markets

vanguard are the cheapest but your assetts will be in dollars
ishares ( blackrock ) are slightly more expensive but you can buy one which is denominated in euro

you should recieve a dividend of at least 3% per year on any of those funds while you wait for growth

you will need to open an account with a stockbroker , i would recomend td waterhouse , the irish based stockbrokers are a rip off when it comes to fees

I was about to point out the many flaws in this guy's post, but it's not really worth it since he is now banned.

Cavehill Red

Hi Liam. Perhaps I'm a bit obtuse, but I don't see how this:

Roonbox wrote: »

In a very simplified form...
We have a world wide economic slowdown taking place now(Europe and the U.S especially) and China has slowed a lot in recent months also.
Each round of QE in the U.S has had less effect than the one beforehand and since the most recent "QEfinity" the FED has essentially shot all their bullets..
When we have a slowdown again, as has always happened every 4 - 6 years, their will be major difficulties as the FED cannot quadrouple the balance sheet again.
European countries that are bankrupt will eventually have to face reality also.
You can protect yourself in hard assets.
Liam

explains this:

Roonbox wrote:

I see Stock falling, Commodities Falling, the dollar Index & Bonds rising..
Basically Sept '08 to Mar '09.

Surely your prognosis in the later post would suggest the opposite of what you suggested in your earlier one, ie a crisis that would lead to a plummetting dollar index and ever-rising commodity prices?

handlemaster

DarkDusk wrote: »

Having a large savings denominated in euros is risky in these times, imo. The Swiss franc is a much safer currency, you should try and look into having your savings based there. If Greece defaults (which will eventually happen), the Spanish will do a run on the banks (followed by Portugal and the rest of the eu, including us!), and the euro will collapse, a splitting of the currency being the best case scenario. In this case, the buying power of your euros will drop dramatically (inflation). The Swiss have a very stable currency, they are currently trying to devalue it to keep their exports competitive.

do the swiss not buy euro bonds thus completing the circle ?

upforit101

DarkDusk wrote: »

I was about to point out the many flaws in this guy's post, but it's not really worth it since he is now banned.

I'd be interested to know anyway (as I'm sure others are)
Thanks in advance.

PeepingTom2102

I too have 42k in tsb savings im only getting about 650 quid per annum absolute joke it is..Im only 22 so wouldn't mind locking it up somewhere for a while if it meant a decent return

dakan

I've started taking some of the advise detailed so far. But money in a 10 year state savings bond just today.

DarkDusk

dakan wrote: »

I've started taking some of the advise detailed so far. But money in a 10 year state savings bond just today.

The full 52k?

mervuedude

Here's what I'd do if I had 50k.

10k in gold kruggerands (hedge against everything)
10k in Microsoft - pays a dividend and share price should keep up with inflation
10k in Walmart - proven brand, pays a dividend and unlikely to go bust.
10k in Gillette - world dominator in their field, again pays a dividend and price will continue to rise, slowly.
The last 10k is a real gamble, but if it comes off you'll be quids in. Buy Bank of Ireland and forget about it for 15/20 years.

Markets will rise for the next few years what will all the quantative easing in USA and Europe. Shed loads of cash floating around, buying and selling shares. It's supposed to be helping out SME's etc, but that was never going to happen.

handlemaster

dakan wrote: »

I've started taking some of the advise detailed so far. But money in a 10 year state savings bond just today.

don't just take what is said on a forum. Do your own research. 10 years is a long time to lock your money away for.

Thargor

There might be better dividend paying shares out there, Oil majors maybe, BP is still 20-30% down from deepwater Horizon and their profits are only going to increase, they recently increased thei dividend aswell. Microsoft could be on a long slippery slope down now or else stagnant at best, their whole business model might be obsolete. Piracy/Android/Apple/Tablets/Smartphones vs PCs, pressure on them is only going to get worse going forward. Windows 8 is not getting good user reviews and their phones havent a hope of competing against Apple and android.

handlemaster

Thargor wrote: »

There might be better dividend paying shares out there, Oil majors maybe, BP is still 20-30% down from deepwater Horizon and their profits are only going to increase, they recently increased thei dividend aswell. Microsoft could be on a long slippery slope down now or else stagnant at best, their whole business model might be obsolete. Piracy/Android/Apple/Tablets/Smartphones vs PCs, pressure on them is only going to get worse going forward. Windows 8 is not getting good user reviews and their phones havent a hope of competing against Apple and android.

It says alot when you don't see microsofts products been mentioned even after a new launch just a few days ago.

Thargor

I saw a video of the new MS Word on Surface struggling to keep up with a journalists slow touch-typing and thats how its shipped apparently, it wasnt pretty, lots of other quirks aswell that seem designed to turn people off the whole thing (2-tier OS, wtf?), we'll see what the final product is like but the damage might be done. Google docs and the cloud another thing I should have mentioned up there aswell, MS really need to start adapting quickly, sorry for going o/t.

willietherock

dakan wrote: »

I've started taking some of the advise detailed so far. But money in a 10 year state savings bond just today.

What rate of return are you getting? No expert whatsoever but these types of investments strikes me as highly risky. Lending to a bankrupt tends not to be advised. Add in the precious metal crowd screaming hyperinflation , potential breakup of Euro ect Personally I think 10yrs is too long. I bought 3 yr 10% saving bonds and Euro equites which were dividend yielding 5%+ awhile back.There is still decent bank saving products around if you look.

Pawwed Rig

KBC were offering a competitive return for a 15 month deposit. Might be worth looking into if you want the money working immediately.

I would agree with other posters re Swiss Franc. I don't see there being much value in it at the moment. Currency trading will not be low risk no matter which currency you go into at this stage.

DarkDusk

Pawwed Rig wrote: »

I would agree with other posters re Swiss Franc. I don't see there being much value in it at the moment. Currency trading will not be low risk no matter which currency you go into at this stage.

The only reason I suggested the Swiss Franc was because the OP wanted a low risk investment. Therefore, I assumed that he wanted to stay with a savings/bond type investment. Since the Euro is a very risky currency to have your savings in now, I suggested the Franc as an alternative, it being relatively more stable. The Swiss could easily go back to a Gold Standard also, they are currently talking about making gold a parallel currency.

If I was investing the 52k, the whole lot of it would go into physical silver and gold, 30k silver and 22k gold.

dakan

DarkDusk wrote: »

The full 52k?

No not all. I'm dividing it up into different amounts and putting it in a number of places. The state savings was something I could get done during lunch.

dakan

mervuedude wrote: »

Here's what I'd do if I had 50k.

10k in gold kruggerands (hedge against everything)

I have been looking at buying physical silver. There is another thread discussing it. But perhaps not 10ks worth.

DarkDusk

dakan wrote: »

I have been looking at buying physical silver. There is another thread discussing it. But perhaps not 10ks worth.

Best way to buy silver is through Geiger Edelmetalle in Germany. However, their quota has been reached for selling outside Germany this year. In January you could contact them, hopefully the price will not have exploded by then. The prices are more or less the same for Irish bullion sellers, but the VAT will absolutely kill you.

tom_thumb

dakan wrote: »

I have been looking at buying physical silver. There is another thread discussing it. But perhaps not 10ks worth.

you could buy unallocated silver through goldcore in dublin 2 , they charge 2% commission to buy and 1% to sell , very reliable company to deal with

i own unallocated silver with them since september 2011 , been waiting since then to get back to the price i started with :mad:

DarkDusk

Welcome Tom! So, you aren't associated with goldcore at all, then?

tom_thumb

DarkDusk wrote: »

Welcome Tom! So, you aren't associated with goldcore at all, then?

even i said no , how could you be sure

thier a reputable and well known bullion dealer

besides if i had connections with goldcore , i wouldnt admit to being slightly sceptical about the PM market , i bought silver at 28 euro fourteen months ago , intend to sell as soon as it gets close to $ 40 which should be around the 32 euro mark , hopefull this happens in the next six months

beachyboy

This is probably a very simple question for this forum but here goes:
What makes precious metal keep its value? surely if we do face a total economic crisis precious metal will fall quicker than anything and the only things that will hold there value will be food water and energy.

DarkDusk

tom_thumb wrote: »

even i said no , how could you be sure

thier a reputable and well known bullion dealer

besides if i had connections with goldcore , i wouldnt admit to being slightly sceptical about the PM market , i bought silver at 28 euro fourteen months ago , intend to sell as soon as it gets close to $ 40 which should be around the 32 euro mark , hopefull this happens in the next six months

What was the reason you intended to invest in silver in the first place, may I ask?

tom_thumb

beachyboy wrote: »

This is probably a very simple question for this forum but here goes:
What makes precious metal keep its value? surely if we do face a total economic crisis precious metal will fall quicker than anything and the only things that will hold there value will be food water and energy.

metals will of course fall heavy in the event of a 2008 ( or worse ) style meltdown but they will not fall as heavy as stocks and will recover quicker , im sceptical of the idea that in the event of armegeddon , gold will be $5000 an ounce over night , its a fairly good idea to have a percentage of your assett portfolio in metals but around 5% is enough

tom_thumb

DarkDusk wrote: »

What was the reason you intended to invest in silver in the first place, may I ask?

like a lot of people , i got on the bandwagon , ive made money speculating on gold in the past two years but have still to break even with silver

enda1

Warning, zombie thread!!

dakan wrote: »

Hi Folks,

I'm looking for some advise on what to do with €52,000 lying in a Permanent TSB a/c. It used to be in Northern Rock and I was getting 3.25% interest. Despite initial promises that the rate would stay the same when P.TSB took over from NR, the rate has now dropped to 2.75%.

I would like to invest it somewhere that is 'no' to 'low' risk and I would likely be in as position to add €2000 every 3 months.

Thanks for any advise.
Dakan.

Roonbox wrote: »

Buy physical Silver when the price collapses in the next year and you will not regret it in 4 years time

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Why do you believe the price of physical silver will collapse, when it has already decoupled from the listed market price?

Oops! :P

Cute Hoor

Fascinating looking back on some of these old threads.
How have you got on OP