Happy Christmas from the Borings

Oh my giddy aunt. It’s the last blog of the year as we fall into Christmas. Here’s a quick review of 2024 – and a look ahead to 2025.

Stock markets went up. Yay.

The FTSE 100 – as I write – is sitting at 8,060. Up a fairly measly 4.3% for 2024 so far. No sequins here.

The S&P 500 has had a blistering year and risen from 4,745 on 2 January to 5,867 today – a cracker of an increase of around 24%.

Let’s put it another way. If you’d invested £10,000 in the S&P 500 in January, it would be worth about £12,400 today. Had you sat in cash, with market-leading providers, this same £10,000 would have turned into something like £10,400. (Rough calcs only before the actuaries start shouting at me!)

Interest rates have stayed stubbornly high – as has inflation. Boo.

Interest rates have fallen from 5.25% at the beginning of the year to 4.75% with no change announced yesterday.

And sticky old inflation has fallen from 4% in January to 2.6% in November. But it’s hanging around like that nasty cold Brussel sprout on the Christmas lunch table.

Persistent inflation is going nowhere fast which means 2025 doesn’t look that much rosier for mortgage holders, although cash savers and people on the hunt for annuities will find some cheer.

In the US on Wednesday the Fed poured cold water on the prospect of significant rate cuts next year (markets are expecting 2 cuts now, not 6), which in turn saw the S&P 500 fall by 3% in response, and my forecast Santa Rally came shuddering to a halt! Bah humbug.

The housing market has returned to growth. Not bad.

According to Halifax, the average house price in the UK now stands at £298,083, thanks to a fifth consecutive month of rises. Property prices are 4.8% higher than a year earlier.

There’s also movement and activity. According to Zoopla, sales agreed are 19% higher than this time last year, with buyer demand 25% higher.

The general economic outlook? Mweh.

As we move into 2025, it all feels a little precarious, with recent data showing a pullback in hiring, lower corporate confidence and two months of falling GDP. Scrooge alert.

The gradual realisation that interest rates will stay higher for longer is raining on the FTSE’s parade and the pound has had a seasonal carb slump, down to $1.25 as global traders give the UK the equivalent of a 5/10 score on the Strictly Christmas Special.

So what’s next?

As for what to expect next year, Trump, geopolitics and China are on everyone’s radar. Will we see yet more steam in the US markets and stimulus packages to boost China? Will the sabre-rattling about tariffs and trade wars actually materialise? Will the UK hit a technical recession or will the spring bring some green shoots of recovery?

Oh cheer up Grinch!

But, goodness me, enough of this, my friends! It’s time to down tools for a week or so, to pull up the drawbridge to 2024 (which personally speaking, I will not miss) and we can dispense with numbers until next year. Unless you're one of the 4,757 people who like to submit their annual tax return on Christmas Day! (2023 data from HMRC, I didn’t make that up!)

Who gets Craig’s 10?

If you do have a moment in between the madness, and feel like casting your vote for our 2025 Reader’s Choice award for the best investment platform out there, you can do so using this link which would be fantastically helpful. We’ll be announcing them, along with all our 2025 Best Buy winners, on 12 February 2025.

So that is it. Sayonara 2024, thank you and may Santa smile on you all. A special thanks to the 26-strong Boring Money team who have been so fantastic to work with, as we grow and expand the business. And - to all our brilliant readers – I’m grateful for your interest, engagement and kind feedback this year. We’ve grown from 22,000 blog readers at the start of the year to 52,000 today and 2025 is set to be a huge year with some exciting plans.

In the meantime, I wish you all a healthy, restful and happy Christmas. And now I’m off to throw myself into the sea – not in a Sylvia Plath fit of despair – but in pursuit of peace and quiet and wrinkle-freezing fat-busting water!!!

Ho-Ho Holly

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