What Does the Biden Administration bring to Ireland?

With the inauguration of Joe Biden, an ending of the four years of the highly debated Trump Administration begins. Many people are overjoyed with the change in power, but there is also some doubt. The main focus of Biden, as stated in his inauguration speech is to “restore the soul of America”, but what does that mean and entail for Ireland and our relationship with the US?

The effects of US government policies have long-lasting effects on the Ireland economy. Especially changes in corporate tax code on the US international companies that operate within our borders, employing nearly 160,000 people. These businesses are the case of nearly a €7 billion unforeseen fall of Irish corporation tax receipts over the last half-decade. The Trump administration was a strong advocate for tax reforms aimed to bring said organizations’ operations closer to home in the US. This included nearly a 10.5% charge on global low-taxed income, or otherwise known as the Gilti tax. The Gilti profits tax has been set far too low, and therefore did not discourage US companies to shift their …

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Healthy Relationships with Money and your SO

Lots of people say money complicates things. Well, it may be true in some situations but being transparent about your significant other and money is important. Over the years you will attract what you are worth and what you put out there. How you act to others is a direct effect of how others will view you, this is not only for significant others but friends, family, etc. You worried you are with the wrong person or attracting the wrong people you might need to start reevaluating yourself.

Speak to your partners. Do you like saving money? Do you like investing? Do you like getting good deals? Communication is key. Being on the same page with each other is important to know each other’s values. By doing so, as partners you can start compromising to avoid unsaid annoyances. Letting each other know right from the beginning shows exactly who you are and who they are. It makes it easy to find someone like you or believes in the same things as you.

Money may be a taboo topic. Having conversations …

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Morgan Stanley Borrowing on the Bond Market

The stock market and Trading has been the hot topic of the past decade. Many young individuals look towards buying and trading stocks as the next fast way to make money. But the market is much harder to understand than it seems on the surface.

Morgan Stanley, one of the largest American based investment banks, has recently invested just over 400 million Euros on the bond market to secure against a group of buy-to-let mortgages and owner-occupiers located in Ireland. And of these, some vulture funds were bought not from the banks themselves, but rather from third-party locations such as Lone Star and Cerberus.

Generally, a vulture fund is a type of hedge fund, which is privately owned and operated. They are invested in debt considered to be weak or at default, which is also known as distressed securities. These vulture funds are looking to manage and overturn these debts to draw in a profit. Yet despite the large number of home loans in Ireland that were price-reduced following the most recent crash, vulture funds are seeing a hard time …

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Quarantine Leading to a Rise in Property Prices

As the COVID quarantine still impacts our daily lives by forcing people to work from home and limit public interaction, the predicted property prices in Ireland are said to skyrocket as much as 6% this upcoming year. In the newly released annual review today by The Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI), out of their three agents, two of them predicted an increase in property rates in 2021.

While that 6% is said to be an average across Ireland, different areas are predicted to have slightly varying inflated rates. For example, Dublin, as the area with the highest current prices, is predicted to see an average increase of 3% in property prices. But for other areas such as Leinster and Munster, are predicted to have price increases of 4% and 5 % respectively. Some areas are predicted to see price increase reflecting this past year within the range of 1-3%, yet other areas are predicted to experience price increases that could even reach 8%.

According to SCSI’s vice president; TJ Cronin, many of these seen increases in prices are said …

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ETF payment to Irish Life

If you want to make an ETF payment to Irish Lifey you’ll need their bank details, but before you do that it’s worth considering what you are about to do and why.

We assume the ‘why’ part is that you are buying a financial product or funding one, that could mean either buying some type of assurance policy or topping up a pension, but have you considered the alternatives? If you went through a broker then perhaps you have, but if you didn’t then you might want to consider some independent advice because not all policies, charges or choices are universal, they differe across different providers.

We can help you determine what pension plan may suit you the most, or what fudn is most appropriate to your needs. Not only that, we can often get peole a higher allocation (and reduced fees) which means you get more bang for your buck (euro) than you would otherwise because a broke can manipulate the charges more favourably towards a client than the insurance companies do directly. So consider giving us a call, …

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How to get a mortgage in Germany

The rights to a real estate property that are held by the person who owns the property (house, land, apartment etc.) are given to a bank in order to receive other benefits in return. These benefits are usually cash benefits. The mortgage is used in banking as security for loans. The possible amount of the mortgage is determined by the value of the property. Mortgages can be given by banks. In case people need help regarding mortgages there are different branches that can help. Mortgage brokers help people to arrange the mortgage between the borrower and lender and a real estate agent helps buyers and sellers find or sell a property. Getting a mortgage has several advantages such as that the interest rates are generally lower than for other types of borrowing and that a mortgage is easy to repay due to it is repaid little by little on a monthly basis. But a mortgage can also be disadvantageous because the interest rates on mortgages are changing from time to time and can increase suddenly o the borrower has to pay …

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Irish Insurance Brokers

Insurance brokers can offer a wide variety of services to customers. Some brokers specialize in certain areas of Insurance, investments, Pensions and other financial products. The main benefit of using the services of a broker over say a bank is that with a broker there are a number of different services offered to the client. In most cases banks are tied to an insurance agency so the client can only get 1 quote with them. In a brokerage, you will find a number of different providers with multiple different quotes and rates. This gives the broker some leverage over the insurance agencies in order to get the client the best deal available to them. 

For a potential client, the most time efficient way to price the market for a policy is to use a broker. The broker will offer the most suitable product available at the best price and in many circumstances improve on the policy already in place through a bank. 

There are a variety of insurance products on the market to suit every need. Life assurance on the …

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Entering the World of Investments

Whether you are a new investor or have an established portfolio, investing in any area can be scary and confusing. There are many different ways to invest your money, but how and where you do depends on many factors. The one term that encompasses all these factors is risk tolerance. When investing, you always need to ask yourself “what’s my risk tolerance?”

There are 4 key factors when analyzing your risk tolerance.

1: Your investment time frame

This may be the most broad factor, but it has rung true for most investors. the main logic behind this is the more time you have to invest, the more amount of risk you can afford. Say an investment goes south while you are still relatively young. You have a greater amount of time to make up for this loss compared to a person a little older. However, like I said before, this is a very broad rule and further considerations are needed to decide which investment is right for you.

2: Your Risk Capital

The amount of money you actually have to …

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Boom or bubble and will it bust or burst?

This is a piece that Karl wrote for the Irish Sun, it relates to a piece that was the lead story for the paper last week.

(Begins)

There is a lot of talk that we have a ‘property bubble forming’, with virtually no supply, a growing population and a trend towards smaller households as things like separation and divorce become more common, it simply lacks ‘bubble’ qualifications.

But it does have ‘boom’ written all over it, we have had many such booms and busts in Irish history, I have spent much of the last two years researching just this very thing with Frank Quinn from Blackrock College of Further Education.

We have had many price rises and falls in the last 300 years, often we saw that after a crash the next boom would result in overcrowding because back then, as now, supply became ‘short’ in the areas that it was needed.

A boom is about rapid price appreciation, it doesn’t mean you have a bubble. You could have the price of anything boom and there wouldn’t be a bubble, …

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Slow growth economy stock returns

There is a growing body of work suggesting that many developed countries will cease to roar ahead at 3%+ growth rates in the future, that instead we are likely to see a growth rate of about 2% p.a. leading to a ‘steady state’ economy.

If you look at the USA the inflation rate was only 1.9% over the decade from 2000-2010. If you strip out the 2008 recession effect it still only comes out at 2.6%. This could mean that Bernanke’s approach of effectively putting a floor on stock prices could lead to a revision irrespective of intentions.

Take a look at the picture below.

This could mean that in the future the standard P/E expectations could drop and a corresponding dividend yield increase become the natural premium or expectation of stock market investment, strangely; this will be getting back to the original reason people invested in stocks prior to the 20yr secular bull of the 80’s-late 90’s.

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