Introducing the Saga Investments portfolios
When you invest with Saga Investments, you have a choice of three ready-made investment portfolios. Each portfolio comes with a different investment objective and level of risk. You just need to choose the one that’s best aligned to your individual circumstances and goals.
Designed by HUB Financial Solutions, the portfolios are ‘multi-asset investment portfolios’. This means they give you the opportunity to invest in a number of funds that between them hold a wide range of different types of assets like cash, bonds and company shares (or ‘equities’), across UK and international markets.
This diverse range of assets helps spread the investment risk while giving your money the opportunity to grow over time (usually at least five years).
Each fund is managed by an established fund management company. These are shown in the portfolio fact sheets.
With the exception of the Federated Hermes Short-Term Sterling fund, the funds are all ‘passive funds’. This means they’re designed to consistently track stock market indexes, which helps keep costs low for customers.
As with any investment, the value of your investments and the income received from them can fall as well as rise. This means you may not get back the amount you invested.
Choosing your investment portfolio
When choosing your investment portfolio, you’ll need to think about your investment goals and timelines to achieve them. You’ll also need to consider how you feel about the idea of ups and downs in the value of your money.
Ideally you need to find a balance between the level of risk to your money that you’re comfortable with, and the returns you need to achieve your objectives.
You should also consider your financial circumstances and be comfortable you have the available cash after allowing for your day-to-day living costs and any other regular savings (for example pension contributions).
It’s also a good idea to make sure you’ve got no outstanding unsecured short-term or high-interest debt, and that you’ve got enough money set aside for emergencies. You can’t always withdraw ISA/GIA money quickly as it takes time to sell investments (up to five days). Or the time might not be right to sell your investments, for example if there’s a downturn in the market and your money has gone down in value.
If you need additional support to identify which investment portfolio will best meet your needs, this will not be the right service for you.
The investment portfolios
Here’s a brief overview of the aims and risks of each of the portfolios. Please bear in mind that this is just for information, and performance is not guaranteed as returns will depend on the actual performance of the funds.
For more information about each of the investment portfolios, please see the individual portfolio fact sheets.
1. Cautious Growth Portfolio. Volatility: Lower Potential for long-term growth: Lower
This is the lower risk choice of the three investment portfolios. It aims for cautious growth, with lower volatility. The value of your money will still rise and fall in line with movements in world markets.
This portfolio may be right for you if:
- You want to grow your money steadily over the medium to long term (at least five years) but are more focused on preventing losses than making large gains, and
- You’re happy with the idea of smaller ups and downs.
Read more about the Cautious Growth Portfolio.
2. Balanced Growth Portfolio. Volatility: Medium Potential for long-term growth: Moderate
This is the medium risk choice of the three investment portfolios. It aims for moderate growth, with medium volatility. The value of your money will rise and fall in line with movements in world markets.
This portfolio may be right for you if:
- You place equal importance on growing your money and managing potential losses over the medium to long term (at least five years), and
- You’re comfortable seeing ups and downs to try and get good investment returns.
Read more about the Balanced Growth Portfolio.
3. Adventurous Growth Portfolio. Volatility: Higher Potential for long-term growth: Higher
This is the higher risk choice of the three investment portfolios. It aims for higher medium to long-term growth, but is more likely to have higher volatility and a greater risk of loss. The value of your money will rise and fall in line with movements in world markets – and is likely to rise and fall more than with lower risk portfolios.
This portfolio may be right for you if:
- Investment growth over the medium to long term (at least five years) is a priority for you, and
- You’re willing to accept bigger ups and downs to try and achieve high returns.
Read more about the Adventurous Growth Portfolio.
You can find more information about how the investment portfolios work in the Frequently Asked Questions.
Keeping your investments on track
When you open a Saga Investments product, the way your money’s invested will depend on the investment portfolio you have selected.
Each investment portfolio sets a mix of funds that’s designed to achieve a specific investment objective and provide a particular level of risk. This is known as the ‘target fund mix’. You can find the target fund mix for each investment portfolio in the portfolio fact sheets.
Once you’ve chosen your investment portfolio, your money will be invested based on the target fund mix.
Over time, each fund held within your Saga investments portfolio will rise or fall in value differently based on the underlying investments it holds. This means the mix of funds in your portfolio will differ slightly from the target fund mix.
To ensure this difference doesn’t become significant, your portfolio will be ‘rebalanced’ every three months. A rebalance determines whether buying or selling funds is necessary to ensure your investments stay close to the target fund mix of the investment portfolio. This helps it achieve the investment objective and stay within the defined level of risk.
You’ll be able to see which funds have been bought and sold by going into your online account a few days after the rebalance has taken place. You may not see buying or selling on all your funds. This is because the rebalance will only arrange deals where at least a £10 holding in the fund is being bought or sold.
You can find more information about portfolio rebalancing here.
The Glide Path feature
If you’re investing with a specific goal in mind, you may have a fairly good idea when you’ll need to access your money. If this is more than five years away, you may want your investment to automatically reduce in risk as you come closer to this point in time. This helps reduce the risk of your money going down in value just when you’re planning to use it.
That’s why we offer the Glide Path feature.
You can choose this option when you first invest, or you can switch it on at any point in the future. Your money will then automatically switch down into a lower risk-rated portfolio which aims for lower volatility and the likelihood of smaller ups and downs.
Find out more information about how the Glide Path works.
Choosing the Glide Path feature
You can choose the Glide Path feature when you first invest. You just select ‘Choose a Glide Path’ and then tell us which level of risk you want to start off with.
You can also switch on the Glide Path feature at any time after you’ve invested by logging in to your online account.
And if your needs change at any point in the future, there’s the option to switch off the Glide Path feature whenever you like.
If you like the idea of being able to switch to another investment portfolio, but prefer to do this at a time of your choice, you can arrange a switch with no charge by phoning the Saga Investments team on 0800 302 9755.
The information provided on this website should not be taken as a recommendation, advice or forecast. Tax depends on your personal tax position. Tax rules are subject to change by the UK Government.
Hubwise Securities Limited (FRN 502619) is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, is an ISA Plan Manager (HMRC ISA Plan Manager Z1723) and a Member of the London Stock Exchange.
