The Reluctant Investor
@thereluctantinv.bsky.social
Retired in 2020 living off #ISAs and #SIPP #pension. Reluctant investor who's picked up more about investing than he ever wanted to. I'm not Warren Buffet so please DYOR
My hastily produced 2025 review which helps me 12 months down the line so don't feel guilty for ignoring it!
thereluctantinvestor.blogspot.com/2026/01/2025...
thereluctantinvestor.blogspot.com/2026/01/2025...
January 4, 2026 at 6:01 PM
My hastily produced 2025 review which helps me 12 months down the line so don't feel guilty for ignoring it!
thereluctantinvestor.blogspot.com/2026/01/2025...
thereluctantinvestor.blogspot.com/2026/01/2025...
1/ Happy New Year to all. Been quite a year both personally and financially. Reduced holdings down to 46. 2nd best year ever as my stubborn adherence to the UK finally proves a broken clock etc...
Overall growth across all PFs is 16.78%, as ever taking balances + cash withdrawn
Overall growth across all PFs is 16.78%, as ever taking balances + cash withdrawn
January 1, 2026 at 12:00 PM
1/ Happy New Year to all. Been quite a year both personally and financially. Reduced holdings down to 46. 2nd best year ever as my stubborn adherence to the UK finally proves a broken clock etc...
Overall growth across all PFs is 16.78%, as ever taking balances + cash withdrawn
Overall growth across all PFs is 16.78%, as ever taking balances + cash withdrawn
Trimmed back another £9k of #BRWM yesterday to bring it to 10k. May prove to be trimming the flowers etc... but I've sat and watched gains evaporate before and over target commodities exposure.
January 1, 2026 at 11:58 AM
Trimmed back another £9k of #BRWM yesterday to bring it to 10k. May prove to be trimming the flowers etc... but I've sat and watched gains evaporate before and over target commodities exposure.
More than happy to see Saba take a stake in #GSF if only to accelerate something. Anything. Was considering pulling the plug on the 50% capital loss and moving on....
www.marketscreener.com/news/saba-ca...
www.marketscreener.com/news/saba-ca...
Saba Capital Management discloses about 10.08% stake in Gore Street Energy Storage Fund as at Dec 12 - filing
Gore Street Energy Storage Fund PLC:
Saba Capital Management discloses about 10.08% stake in Gore Street Energy Storage Fund as at Dec 12 versus prior stake of about 5.02% - filing
...
www.marketscreener.com
December 16, 2025 at 6:04 PM
More than happy to see Saba take a stake in #GSF if only to accelerate something. Anything. Was considering pulling the plug on the 50% capital loss and moving on....
www.marketscreener.com/news/saba-ca...
www.marketscreener.com/news/saba-ca...
#DGI9 : "No-one better than us at creative NAV accounting"
#HGEN: "Hold my 🍺"
Finally exited another alt poster child - I've seen this play before. More reputational damage to a tarnished sector. Maybe Saba will be the catalyst for something more than a few discount closings
#HGEN: "Hold my 🍺"
Finally exited another alt poster child - I've seen this play before. More reputational damage to a tarnished sector. Maybe Saba will be the catalyst for something more than a few discount closings
November 27, 2025 at 10:55 AM
De-risked some risky 50k of debt in #TFIF and dumped 100k into perennial fave Royal London Extra Yield Bond fund. All in our SIPPs. Enjoy your weekend 🍻
November 21, 2025 at 4:29 PM
De-risked some risky 50k of debt in #TFIF and dumped 100k into perennial fave Royal London Extra Yield Bond fund. All in our SIPPs. Enjoy your weekend 🍻
Only got a small holding (-52%) in still-suspended #HGEN who seem to have taken inspo from another "niche" diversifier (#DGI9) and mis-valued NAV. Weird how it's never under-valued 🤔
Averaged down £1400 in #HGEN today. Not advice, DYOR etc... but been some momentum of late
October 29, 2025 at 11:21 AM
Only got a small holding (-52%) in still-suspended #HGEN who seem to have taken inspo from another "niche" diversifier (#DGI9) and mis-valued NAV. Weird how it's never under-valued 🤔
Trimmed this chunk of #BRWM back to 16k today to bank 5k. That's more than replaced the 4k tax we paid taking it out of the SIPP to gift into son's ISA 😁
Added 16k of #BRWM to bring commodities exposure up to 5%. Hoping it fares better than previous inflation-linked decisions.
October 10, 2025 at 7:42 PM
Trimmed this chunk of #BRWM back to 16k today to bank 5k. That's more than replaced the 4k tax we paid taking it out of the SIPP to gift into son's ISA 😁
Sold 11k of my 21k of #IBT in my SIPP. Not sure I have the patience to wait another 4.5 years for it to reach this level again for a relatively low yield. Underweight specific pharma and not really sure how useful a 5% weighting is in the grand scheme of things.
October 2, 2025 at 3:37 PM
Sold 11k of my 21k of #IBT in my SIPP. Not sure I have the patience to wait another 4.5 years for it to reach this level again for a relatively low yield. Underweight specific pharma and not really sure how useful a 5% weighting is in the grand scheme of things.
Sold ~half of remaining #GSK - it's in the income ISA and isn't a particularly high yield so will try to take profits within the 12-18 range. Which will probably fail so end up purchasing less volatile 8% debt income in the end 😉
October 2, 2025 at 8:17 AM
Sold ~half of remaining #GSK - it's in the income ISA and isn't a particularly high yield so will try to take profits within the 12-18 range. Which will probably fail so end up purchasing less volatile 8% debt income in the end 😉
1/3 I have to put you thru the quarterly rigmarole as it forces me to evaluate what I'm doing on a regular basis. Had a big chunk (230k) in cash/MM during Peru trip and not in a hurry to interrupt the progress YTD as 2025.Q3 is up 3.3% for total YTD (inc divis) of 🥁🥁 12.8%
October 1, 2025 at 2:34 PM
1/3 I have to put you thru the quarterly rigmarole as it forces me to evaluate what I'm doing on a regular basis. Had a big chunk (230k) in cash/MM during Peru trip and not in a hurry to interrupt the progress YTD as 2025.Q3 is up 3.3% for total YTD (inc divis) of 🥁🥁 12.8%
Ended up with 17% in just under a year disposing of this today for total return of £5847 as a #GSK top-slice. Not even had time to post the Q3 numbers yet...
Re-bought 5k of #GSK that I sold in January in our income ISA for 130p less in the "trading" ISA, hoping for a 10%+ gain sometime in next 12 months. So leaving core 15k holding in income ISA and trying to "trade" around the peaks and troughs. An experimental approach and WIP!
October 1, 2025 at 2:21 PM
Ended up with 17% in just under a year disposing of this today for total return of £5847 as a #GSK top-slice. Not even had time to post the Q3 numbers yet...
Just back from month away and pleased to see #BRWM allocation going ok so far whilst we've been YOLOing. Few PE holdings like #OCI, #IPO, #ICGT done well too. I'm liking the much more boring look to our PFs
Added 16k of #BRWM to bring commodities exposure up to 5%. Hoping it fares better than previous inflation-linked decisions.
July 22, 2025 at 12:45 PM
2025.Q2 numbers are as in as working on Slovenian campsite WiFi will allow and I'm more than pleased with over 9% YTD with Q2 putting in a respectable 7%. Holding on to renewables, REITs and boring debt and insurance income finally coming good.
June 30, 2025 at 8:12 PM
2025.Q2 numbers are as in as working on Slovenian campsite WiFi will allow and I'm more than pleased with over 9% YTD with Q2 putting in a respectable 7%. Holding on to renewables, REITs and boring debt and insurance income finally coming good.
For reasons outside our control we are on a month-long van trip round bits of Europe, currently roasting in Bled. There are lots of pics I could post to represent the holiday so far but this one from Kitzbuhel seems to neatly cover everything
June 30, 2025 at 5:30 AM
For reasons outside our control we are on a month-long van trip round bits of Europe, currently roasting in Bled. There are lots of pics I could post to represent the holiday so far but this one from Kitzbuhel seems to neatly cover everything
The last time we had this much cash was just before taking our lump sums in Jan 2020 and I started dripping money back into markets just before Covid! As we've 2x 5 week trips this year, have lumped 100k into #CSH2 money market ETF for now. Happy to keep our 8% YTD tbh.
June 13, 2025 at 10:58 AM
The last time we had this much cash was just before taking our lump sums in Jan 2020 and I started dripping money back into markets just before Covid! As we've 2x 5 week trips this year, have lumped 100k into #CSH2 money market ETF for now. Happy to keep our 8% YTD tbh.
Been an absolute belter couple of months for the main income ISA. Plus £135 from #CREI over @ajbell.bsky.social
Still to work out how to obtain monthly income like HL present.
Still to work out how to obtain monthly income like HL present.
June 5, 2025 at 10:16 AM
Been an absolute belter couple of months for the main income ISA. Plus £135 from #CREI over @ajbell.bsky.social
Still to work out how to obtain monthly income like HL present.
Still to work out how to obtain monthly income like HL present.
Actually 2 days ago - I'm getting too good at sitting on 👐 in 2025, partly due to being distracted and partly because already on track for 2nd best YTD since my records began 5 years ago and don't want to jinx things with bad choices so cash pile optionality is fine for now.
June 5, 2025 at 9:44 AM
Actually 2 days ago - I'm getting too good at sitting on 👐 in 2025, partly due to being distracted and partly because already on track for 2nd best YTD since my records began 5 years ago and don't want to jinx things with bad choices so cash pile optionality is fine for now.