Child trust fund santander (family investments)

[tootymaloo]

I have Ds's CTF held with family investments run by Santander. We have lost approx 80 off of the investment total over the last month.

Is it safe to leave it or would it be safer to move to Nationwide or somewhere else?

Its only got 1600 in it so not a huge amount but with the latest news what should i be doing?

The stock market has plummetted in the last few weeks so most managed funds have suffered.. The Nationwide is probably the same as everywhere else. However, in the time between now and when your child is 18, the markets will go up and down again several times. Ironically, this is probably a good time to add to the fund and buy more units because they're cheap.

I'm going to guess that it is in some kind of stock exchange tracker fund with low charges. That's fine. It will go up and down with the market, that's what it's supposed to do. The expecation is that in ten years it will be higher than today. We have a financial crisis in Greece, which is frightening everyone, so the markets are dropping.

The only reason for moving it would be if Santander had higher charges than Nationwide, or if Santander was an incompetent bank that couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery, which is why I moved my account away from them.

Take a careful look at the charging structure, trackers should be very cheap to run, but some companies look at the regulated maximum they are allowed to charge, and do that.

Thankyou,

As long as the trust fund is safe, even if the value fluctuates, i'm happy to leave it where it is.
I dont want Santander to collapse if eveyones whipping money out with our little 1600 pounds caught in it! I'm guessing Spain dont have the money to prop up banks like the UK did but i could be wrong.

I have no idea what the charges are tbh, far too technical for me

Santander UK deposits to a certain threshold are covered by the FSA compensation scheme so if they did an IceSave and shut their doors, your £1600 would be recoverable. FWIW unlike so many others back in the 2007/08 crash Santander didn't get a bail-out.... and those that did weren't downgraded by the ratings agencies.

So the safety net still applies to stakeholder investments?

I knew savings had a protected threshold but was worried that stakeholder funds are based on a gamble so if it all went pear shaped, we took the risk so it would be our loss.

We run a crappy bank account for DS now rather than pay into his CTF anymore but that earns nothing. I hadnt considered adding more to the fund whilst prices were low.

Food for thought! His plan has 14 years left to run.

Thankyou

The value of the funds invested are a gamble but the value of the trust fund in total is a specific amount - and if Santander went belly-up, that's the amount they'd owe you. I have a couple of managed funds for DS - he was born in 2000 so didn't qualify for a CTF. I have a Direct Debit set up on each to buy units each month. The amount I invest is fixed but the number of units I buy this month will be a lot higher than last. I keep track of how much profit they've made based on current prices and, despite the 2008 crash and more recent wobbles, they're still doing a little better than a straight savings account.

Thankyou, it really is appreciated

Ds has a birthday very soon, i might do half and half into CTF and boring bank!