Investment clubs

Bored with savings accounts and national savings bonds? Interested in joining an investment club? The Working Lunch guide helps you to get started.

Starting up
An investment club or share club is a group of people who meet regularly and put together an agreed amount of money to invest on the stockmarket. Investing in shares through a club can be an enjoyable and exciting way to learn about how business and money work.

It can sometimes be a way of making money without taking big financial risks alone.

But like all investments on the stockmarket the value of shares can go down as well as up.

In the first of the Working Lunch share club series, the Royal Flush Investment Club had their inaugural meeting and learnt exactly how to go about setting up their club.

The basics

• A club will usually comprise of between three and a maximum of 20 members
  
• Find a good place to meet - and decide when the meetings will be, e.g. the first Tuesday of each month
  
• Democratically decide subscription arrangements and a monthly sum to invest, one you can all afford
  
• Choose a name for your club
  
• Elect your officers - chairperson, honorary secretary and honorary treasurer - and decide upon the constitution and rules of the club
  
• Set up a bank account for the club and appoint a broker
  
• Start researching - read the papers, watch financial news programmes or surf the Internet.
  

It might not make much sense to begin with, but over time it will all become clear!

Starting points

• ProShare 0171 394 5200
  A non-profit making organisation which promotes share-based investment, including investment clubs. Their manual is available to help you start a club, how to run it, including rules and legalities, and advice and tips on how to go about investing your money. You can also register your club with them and receive a quarterly magazine, Manual, which costs £28.00 inc p&p.
  Manual can be ordered online at www.proshare.org.uk

• APCIMs (Association of Private Client and Investment Managers)
  They can provide you with a booklet containing a detailed list of stockbrokers - write to:
  112 Middlesex Street
  London E1 7HY
  or visit the website: www.apcims.org

• London Stock Exchange
  Booklets available on basic share buying and investing, call 0171 797 4444.
  They also have a website: www.londonstockex.co.uk, or for a website linked to other relevant sites try: www.share-aware.co.uk, also run by the London Stock Exchange.
  

Websites

• BBC News Online
  This site has constantly updated share prices - every 20 minutes for the Top 350 shares - and three times a day for all other shares.

• MoneyWorld - www.moneyworld.co.uk
  This is a website that has constantly updated share prices (accurate to within approximately 20 minutes), and has a free service that allows you to run your club's portfolio.
  

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Under the Financial Services Act, we are prohibited from providing personal investment advice by phone or by letter. We are only exempted when we broadcast this advice. The inclusion of any organisation on this fact sheet does not imply an endorsement by the BBC or Working Lunch.