Hargreaves Lansdown has launched a new campaign to encourage people to invest in the UK.
The Get Investing campaign, which will run until 30 June, aims to highlight both the benefits of investing as well as Hargreaves Lansdown’s best ideas on the long term investment opportunities in the UK.
Despite the FTSE 100 hitting record highs, the UK market continues to trade at a 43.5% discount to the US, currently near the biggest discount to the US in over 20 years. The FTSE 100 and the FTSE 250 are also trading at significant discount to the Eurostoxx 50.
Hargreaves Lansdown said the UK offers exposure to world-class companies as well as a diverse range of innovative smaller businesses, some of which are pioneers of emerging industries with the potential to blossom.
Emma Wall, head of investment analysis and research at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: “The UK has a long reputation as a happy hunting ground for income investors and with good reason. Many businesses boast impressive records of growing dividends over the long term. The UK Dividend monitor is predicting British businesses will pay out nearly £90 billion in dividends this year. And that is not the only way businesses are returning cash to shareholders, many companies have diverted cash to share buybacks, worth almost twice as much as dividends in 2023.
“It is a key year for the UK with a number of events which brings focus on investing in the UK, not least a General Election and various rumoured IPOs. Interest rate cuts are on the near horizon, which are positive for equities and negative for savers, making the stock market more attractive on a longer-term view.”
Hargreaves Lansdown said the Artemis Income fund is “one of the best” and well placed to make the most of UK income opportunities, with the fund investing in companies they believe can pay a sustainable income through the market cycle, whatever the economic backdrop.
The investment platform also named Royal London UK Smaller Companies and Fidelity Special Values investment trust as attractive options, with the former aiming to deliver long-term growth by investing in small companies in the UK with plenty of growth potential and the latter employing a “contrarian approach”, investing in unloved large, medium-sized and higher-risk smaller companies.
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