Stocks & Shares ISA

What is a Stocks & Shares ISA?

A Stocks & Shares Individual Savings Account (ISA) is a type of savings and investment account where your money is invested in different types of investments, such as funds, bonds or stocks. It’s a tax-efficient way to save and invest money in the long term, as you won’t pay income or capital gains tax on any returns you could make.

It’s important to think about how much risk you want to take when investing with a Stocks & Shares ISA. We’ll explain more about this later on.

Next, we’ll look at how much money you can put into your Stocks & Shares ISA.

What is the Stocks & Shares ISA allowance?

The rules on how much money you can put into an ISA change every tax year. This is called the ‘ISA Allowance'.

For the 2020/2021 tax year (ending 5 April 2021) you can invest up to £20,000 in a Stocks & Shares ISA. You can even split that amount over different ISAs in a tax year, but not two of the same type. For example, you could have £10,000 in a Stocks & Shares ISA and £10,000 in a Cash ISA in the same tax year.

You can learn more about the ISA allowance in our ‘What is an ISA?’ guide.

Now, let’s take a closer look at how your money is invested with a Stocks & Shares ISA.

How is your money invested in a Stocks & Shares ISA?

Your investment options depend on which provider you choose. For example, money saved into a Standard Life Stocks & Shares ISA is invested in funds.

Here’s a breakdown of different investment types:

• Funds: This is the most common way of investing through an ISA. Funds are basically themed groups of investments that can include a mix of cash, bonds and shares.
• Shares: When you invest money in an individual company you basically own a share of that company’s profits. If the company performs well, your share in the company will gain value.
• Bonds: If a Stocks & Shares ISA supports bonds, it will invest in either corporate or government bonds. This means your money is loaned to either a company or government and you can make money back through the interest.

You can learn more about how investing works in our handy investment guides.

Remember: The value of your investments can fall as well as rise, and they may be worth less than you paid in.