Stocks ISA and stocks

šŸ¤ Help
1

Hi there. Iā€™ve looked through previous topics/posts and maybe this is too basic a question, so apologies in advance. Iā€™ve just transferred money into a stocks ISA from another provider, so my funds are all in Trading 212/s stocks ISA, other than Ā£10 which I moved to Invest, which I think was wrong but no big deal. Do I understand correctly that Trading212 picks the stocks in that stocks ISA? My father is helping me with investing but I donā€™t want to lose the tax-free benefit, but can I choose the stocks I want, within the stocks ISA? It seems very complicated, though I confess numbers arenā€™t my forte and I do feel hugely out of my depth. Basically I want the benefits of the tax-free ISA but to be able to select the stocks I want, but I seem to be too dumb to figure out how.

I guess for clarity, my questions are

  1. can I choose the stocks I want, within the stocks ISA?
  2. If yes to (1), is that a ā€˜pieā€™?
  3. Iā€™m un the UK, can I purchase US shares in $US?
  4. If yes to (2), how? Anytime I want to try to change the currency, it wants to take the money from my external bank account rather than the funds in my stocks ISA.

Thank you so much to anyone who responds!

2

You should be able to move the Ā£10 from your invest account into your ISA as long as it does take you over the 20K limit.

You have to do the investing yourself. If you want to reduce risk and invest across multiple stocks then invest in an ETF.

If you donā€™t understand ETFs, ask AI.

3

Sorry typo: as long as it doesnā€™t take you over the 20K.

4

Yes, you can buy US stocks in USD, but your Stocks & Shares ISA will be in GBP, so an FX fee will be applied to each transaction.

For example, this is from when I sold my $MNDY shares (a company listed on the NASDAQ and denominated in USD):

image
image418Ɨ745 26.8 KB

If you want to have a separate USD account for trading US stocks, I believe you can do that in the Invest account (not S&S ISA), but it is not tax sheltered.

If you are planning to do long-term investing in US stocks, the FX fees are not so important, but you will want to protect your profit from capital gains tax (CGT), so it would be more appropriate to use a S&S ISA for this.

5

Please donā€™t take this the wrong way, but since you say you are new, pick your own sticks in the practice account. That way itā€™s risk free. If it turns out you are good at it, then start buying small quantities in the real account.

There are many articles out there about always keeping it simple is generally best, and that all you need is say an all world equity etf(long term investing). Mr Monevator writes some good ones.

6

thank you so much for this.

1 Like
7

Thank you, and I take it in the way itā€™s intended. Iā€™m clueless but my Dad isnā€™t. My problem is heā€™s in the US so canā€™t help me physically operate the account, and of course isnā€™t allowed access. Heā€™s been there decades so isnā€™t 100% on UK tax, etc. He does this stuff all the time for himself and has given me a list of stocks to buy, but Iā€™m really struggling to operate the platform on my own. Plus, I think I have dyscalculia or something because I really struggle to learn anything relating to numbers.