How to tell if you re a prudent investor or a reckless gambler dailymail.co.uk - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from dailymail.co.uk Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Gambling and investing are worlds apart. One could lose you all your money. The other is a slow and steady route to long-term wealth.
Yet telling the difference between the two is easier said than done. After all, both can involve holding shares in companies or trading other financial instruments.
A new type of investment platform also blurs the line between investing and gambling, peddling high-risk financial instruments alongside safer investments.
Are you gambling? According to the City regulator, a growing number of stock market enthusiasts misguidedly think they are investing when, in truth, they are putting their savings in serious danger by taking on far more risk than they realise
I m looking forward to Wednesday s grilling of NS&I s top brass by members of the powerful Treasury Select Committee over their calamitous running of the Government s savings bank.
It should make for entertaining viewing as the executives, led by chief honcho Ian Ackerley, are made to squirm.
As we have reported extensively in recent months, NS&I was inundated with complaints last year as the quality of its customer service plunged to depths that even deep sea divers would avoid.
Phones weren t answered, letters weren t responded to promptly and promises to customers were not kept.
Pig s ear: NS&I was inundated with complaints last year as the quality of its customer service plunged
Why should it often take the intervention of the press to get financial justice for consumers?
It s a question I regularly ask myself – although I can t deny I thoroughly enjoy the moment whenever a mighty financial services company caves in, usually for fear of getting a pasting in the personal finance pages of The Mail on Sunday.
It makes me feel good and vindicates my profession. For example, over the years I ve managed to get many insurance giants to review claims they had originally rejected and pay out huge sums as a result.
Invariably, the policies were bought to provide financial protection at a time when it is most needed – when a household is struck by long-term illness or a life- threatening health condition.
Our intervention gets reader s £30,300 back from Santander dailymail.co.uk - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from dailymail.co.uk Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.