Where do investment trusts fit into financial planning?

While they’re not always well understood, investment trusts are highly relevant to today’s financial planners.

Listing image

Investment trusts now manage nearly £200 billion of assets across equities, property, fixed income and alternatives. Their assets have doubled in size over the past six and a half years, due to investment performance and new fundraising.

Yet they’re often seen as occupying a different world from financial planning. Their benefits and risks are not always well understood and they are sometimes put in the ‘too complex’ box.

This is not necessarily the fault of financial planners. Investment trusts have historically marketed themselves to wealth managers, institutions and direct investors – bypassing financial planners and advisers.

Yet investment trusts have features that are highly relevant for many individual savers. To take one example, their ability to produce smoother, more predictable income streams is relied on by thousands of direct investors who use investment trusts to support their retirement. Arguably, there is no reason why these benefits should not be relevant to the clients of financial planners.

To bring together the worlds of investment trusts and financial planning, and discuss how the two can work better together, the AIC is running a series of seminars, “Investment trusts in financial planning”. The seminars will be held in Knutsford on 5 November, Guildford on 27 November and Bristol on 28 November. Guest speakers include Jacqueline Lockie, Head of Financial Planning at the CISI, and the events offer 2 hours 15 minutes of structured CPD.

See more details and book your free place