Investing e150k for 1-2 years

Hi all,

My wife and I have been living in Australia for the last 4 years. In this time we've been saving hard with the intention of buying somewhere back home.

We're in our early thirties and are expecting our first children (twins!!) this Christmas. We are planning on moving home to Dublin in a year or so and we would like to make our money work for us back home. At the moment it is sitting here in a HSBC fx account earning 0.5% interest.

Does anyone have any suggestion as to where we could put our cash for 1-2 years? A friend has mentioned opening a Davy's account and sticking the cash in a global equities fund (Blackrock) as it beats the interest we would get from the banks.

I am not willing to risk the entire sum but would consider putting 10-20k in a high risk product and leaving the rest in low risk.

If anyone has any suggestions I would be very grateful.

Cheers,

Gargles

It sounds as if you already have it spent. Why risk losing money for the sake of a grand or two? 1 or 2 years is too short a period for equity investment.

And best of luck with the new arrivals at Christmas. You may find you need to dip into that 150k to pay for all the stuff they need!!

Thanks for the response and yes I reckon I'll have my work cut out if they were anything like me!

I was hoping to take my Euros out of my HSBC a/c here and send it back to Ireland where I could get anything better than 0.5%.

If you think a deposit account is the best place for it I'll have to check them out with my bank so.

Thanks once again.

If you are just looking to do better than 0.5%, then there are loads of deposit accounts in Ireland offering better than that. PTSB and KBC are offering 2.45% and 2.4% respectively over 12 months.

You should have left the money in Australia , they pays attractive rates 4-5% for 12 months compared to here for 2.5 % excluding the 41% Dirt Tax. You should have set up online banking between you bank in australia and a bank in Ireland, so that you can always transfer in between online.

chainsawman said:

You should have left the money in Australia , they pays attractive rates 4-5% for 12 months compared to here for 2.5 % excluding the 41% Dirt Tax. You should have set up online banking between you bank in australia and a bank in Ireland, so that you can always transfer in between online.

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Thanks Chainsawman, we still have the cash in Aus. I converted the AUD to EUR around 85c to the Euro and it has since dropped back to 70c so if I converted it back to AUD we would be doing OK.

I suppose the question is whether we are willing to take the risk of the AUD dropping further over the year period and losing some of the value we got converting back to AUD.

I'll have to get the spreadsheet out and do some simple calculations on it.

Cheers for the input.

I think thats your biggest problem the volatility of the australian dollar, and thats where your biggest issue is not in the deposit rates. The australian dollar has fallen alot this year so may rise a bit short term, its hard to know. However I think the australian dollar is historically overvalued. I think you should be moving a substantial portion of it out of aussie dollars and into euros as that is your eventual plan.

Thanks Joe, yeah looks pretty volatile for the next months especially since the central bank are looking to cut the interest rates further to push down the dollar.

I'd agree with Steven barrett in post #2 above.

In my view, trying to invest in equities with a 1 - 2 year time scale is close to gambling. You might do well but there would be a huge amount of luck involved. In the short term, there are a huge number of utterly unpredictable variables that could go for or against you.

The risks involved with FX speculation are even greater as there are also a huge number of unpredictable variables that can go for or against you, but the movements can often be even more extreme than equity price movements.

If you can afford to gamble with some of the money and can stomach the possibility of a substantial loss, go ahead. Otherwise, leave it in EUR and get the best deposit rate you can.

Hi,
Just something to consider, if can afford to lock away your savings for 3 years the Post Office 3 year Savings Bond is your best bet, it pays 4% free of DIRT (which is due to increase to 41%)
or open 2 regular savings accounts with Nationwide UK (Ireland) - you can save up to €2,000 per month for 15 months @4% variable (You may not have to pay the 41% DIRT as non-residents)

M.