What a treat. That first ice cream of the summer that seems to have cost you ……. how much!?!?! A round of ice creams for the family these days is ridiculous. It seems to leave me handing over a £20 note and getting pennies back in change. What has happened to glorified frozen milk and why am I now frantically slurping at the drops, to make sure I get my monies worth?
Sunshine Should be Good News
Thanks to all this sunshine, I am currently sporting a very nice tan, some great family photos and a not very nice electricity bill from running the fan all night. I am sure some of you are feeling the same at this point and wandering why it suddenly stings a bit that the weather is so lovely.
The fact of the matter is that inflation has put a bit of a dampener on things this summer and there are many things that suddenly seem like a rip off. However, I want to talk to you about where you might be getting ripped off without knowing it and somewhere that you might actually be able to do something about it.
Interesting Times
Hopefully all of you have some savings in the bank for rainy (now sunny) days. Though I know it is a worldwide problem that most don’t, and the squeeze is going to be a lot tighter at the bottom for many. For those of you who were able to squirrel something away in the good times then you are potentially getting pretty beaten up in your nice and safe bank.
Everyone is talking about interest rates going up and some of you might have had a look at the latest savings account offers and taken advantage of this. I have seen 3.3% recently, which is quite ok and only means that last year you will have lost a whopping 5.8% against a 9.1% rate of inflation. Ouch!
To put this into perspective, if you had £10,000 in the bank and this continued for 10 years, this would only be worth the equivalent to £5,502 in today’s money. So you can afford just over half what you can now. So you are gradually getting poorer, from doing nothing.
It’s Obvious. Sell Ice Creams!
So, I am not suggesting you go buy the van, freeze some milk and spend the weekends patrolling with the speakers on. That would be a bit much. However, clearly people like me are always going to be pestered enough by the kids to buy them an ice cream.
What I am suggesting, is that there are companies out there that will be able to put their prices up in line with inflation and yet people will still buy their products. So that company will still make a similar profit or even increase it and with that, the companies value will go up.
So, to save you the expense and the time, you could just look to buy a share of a valuable business like that and a share of that profit. In reality it is a bit more complex than that but that is the general principle of investing and so with interest rates far below inflation, the only way that you have the potential to protect or grow your funds is by investing smartly and that’s where we come in.
Quick, before it Rains
So, if you would like to take that first step and talk to a Financial Adviser, why don’t you contact us here: Contact us
We are independent Financial Planners and our job is to make sure that what you do put away is working hard for you behind the scenes, so that you can ride out this inflation and be better off at the other side.
Fusion Financial Ltd is an appointed representative of In Partnership the trading name of The On-Line Partnership Limited which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Fusion Financial Ltd. Registered in England and Wales No 11600565. Registered Office: Marlborough House, 298 Regents Park Road, Finchley, London, England, N3 2SZ.
