Do any of you play the stock market? ?

I shan’t be doing it I can’t afford it, but I was curious about it. Thank you for answering.

For those who do invest I bet it brings a frisson of excitement now and again. A bit like ‘have I won anything this month on the premium bonds?’. I haven’t got any of those left anymore either.

Perhaps I’ll just place a bet on the Grand National later in the year!
?

We had an inheritance just over a year ago and an investment was offered to us as part of our inheritance. We decided to take it. I'd helped look after this person's finances and knew this investment had made a substantial amount over a 10 year period. There'd also been a bi monthly divided from it.

The investment is with a company that manage and invest in a wide range of assets including Equities, Fixed Income and Real Estate. It's continued to do well for us. In our first year it has gone up just over 10% + we've had the dividends.

These companies can't advise you on what to buy but they show you the performance of the funds they offer before you decide what you want to buy. Like other companies they grade the funds.

I go on line every day to check how they are doing. Martin Lewis offers good advice about this. There's no guarantees and he advises to expect to leave the investment for at least 5 years.

We have our own savings and these have always been earmarked for specific things. We decided to take a gamble. You're right in what you say Urm. Don’t play with what you can’t afford to lose.

*but for

DH doesn't invest for the dividends for the capital growth.

We've had self invested shares for many years. Unfortunately dividends have been dramatically cut or non existent in the past year. It depends which companies you are invested in.

DH has invested very successfully in the last few years. He has a specific area of interest after an OU course he did. He has long term investments and some money he invests on a short term basis, buying and selling usually within a few days.

It is intelligent informed gambling. I couldn’t begin to do it myself, but I pay someone to do it for me. I don’t think the results are very extreme either way.

We have investment ISAs but I wouldn’t call that ‘playing the stock market’ and I certainly don’t regard it as a form of gambling - more about protecting our assets & providing part of our income.