More than three-quarters of investors are planning to make at least partial use of their Individual Savings Account (ISA) allowance for 2009/10, according to respondents to F&C Investments' latest Question of the Month survey.
Even more encouragingly says F&C, one-third say they will have used their full allowance by the end of the current tax year.
This splits roughly equally between over-50s taking advantage of the increased annual limit of £10,200 (17.6 per cent of respondents) and those aged under-50 who are currently allowed to invest a maximum of £7,200 (15.4 per cent of respondents).
The survey, which questions private investors who visit F&C's investment trust website, www.fandc.co.uk, found that respondents were less keen on investing their ISA allowance in cash, perhaps because of the low returns on offer.
Just 4.4 per cent of those under 50 and 7.7 per cent of the over-50s said they planned to make full use of their cash ISA allowance (£3,600 and £5,200 respectively in the current tax year) but not their stocks and shares allowance. A further 31.9 per cent said they would be making “some” use of their allowances this year.
A small number of those taking part in the survey left comments explaining their answers.
Among these, several explained that they were not UK resident and thus unable to take advantage of the ISA allowance, which adds some context to the figure of 23.1 per cent who said they would not be using the ISA allowance this year.
One respondent confidently commented: "Investing now in stocks and shares should offer good long term growth," while another said: "£10,200 for us geriatrics is fine if you can afford it!"
"It's very pleasing to see so many people planning to make use of this valuable tax break,” said Mike Woodward, head of investment trusts at F&C Investments.
“As ISAs are not suitable for everyone, we wouldn't expect to see all our respondents saying they planned to invest, but it is especially encouraging to see almost as many people in the under-50 age.
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