76. Self-Invested Personal Pensions and Inheritance Tax: Why UK Pensions Are Moving Inside the IHT Net and Why You Don’t Need to Panic

Let's talk about the biggest news item I think in the last week or so, which is the Supreme Court walking back the Trump's tariffs.

Or saying the way he's imposed tariffs was illegal.

Wow.

What feels like it, in any other timeline, would be a conclusion or an end state for the question that seems to have opened up a lot more uncertainty.

The question of refunds is on top of everyone's mind right now who gets it when and how he responded by announcing more tariffs, right?

So he's certainly sticking to the theme.

I'm the tacking, just as it's personally, that was quite something.

That was arguably not very presidential.

Um, shock horror.

That's putting it as politely as possible.

Yeah.

An episode recently ended with Tobias Gweed Owens, where we talked about inheritance taxes come into UK pensions, including Sips.

From April 20, 2077, that much we know.

And this is going to affect a lot of expats with large Sips.

And there's a lot of expats in America with large Sips.

And Tobias came on and he thinks there may be, he thinks there is potentially a way to avoid it by investing in non-U.K.

Citus investments.

For us, obviously, it would be US ETF mutual funds.

He believes that that should put the value of those assets outside of the scope of the UK inheritance tax.

Now, this could have serious, like, serious savings for the heirs of the tax pass.

We've got substantial Sips.

Like, tens hundreds of thousands of pounds, such dollars.

So this is just unsurprisingly generated quite a bit of interest from our clients and listeners.

So I think we just want to touch on this, Ruth.

You know, I know sometimes people get sick of us talking about tax, but it really does impact and influence every step of a financial plan, right?

Of an income plan, of an investment plan.

It is there always.

So we always want to be diligent, right?

Vigilant, I should say, diligent, and make sure that your teas are crossed, your eyes are dotted, and you're looking ahead and really using that advanced tax plan.

Yeah.

It provides it.

Absolutely.

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Okay, let's get back to this week's show.

Welcome back to another episode of From the Trenches, the Expat Wealth show where my colleague James Boyle and I bring you behind the scenes of Plan First Wealth as we build this business, as we work with our clients, and as we muddle through life.

And it certainly feels like I'm muddling through life this week, James. How about you?

We're muddling through February, let's say, right? We're trying not to bring the February vibe, so to speak, into the episode, but it is a tough go right now.

I am so sick of snow, and I say this as someone who absolutely loves snow.

Last week, I was skiing with my six-year-old in Vermont, and it was wonderful and magical.

It was a real moment for me. I love skiing, and I was with my kid for the first time doing something together,

where I wasn't just shaperoning them and making sure they didn't kill themselves, although I was doing that, but we were actually skiing together.

I wasn't just hovering over them. It was amazing, it was incredible.

But I needed them to go about school this week. We've had so much snow.

Two schools off two days, and now more snow this morning. It was treacherous out there.

We are so over it over it. It is horrible. It is horrible. February historically is not a great time.

I'm sure we have listeners all over, right? But if you're in the northeast of the US, we have been walloped this year, and repeatedly.

We can't catch a break.

Some people, some concepts of what this is like, because I've never experienced anything like this.

I've been here 10 years, and we don't get anything like this in the UK.

The Boston Globe didn't go to print for the first time in 153 years.

Wait, would it be Monday going into... Wait, when did it really snow massively?

Sunday going into Monday. Sunday into Monday.

Okay, so on Monday, they didn't print for the first time in 153 years.

There was one town in Massachusetts, called Warwick, or Warwick, as they'd probably say.

36 inches of snow. Three feet. I don't know how you cope with that.

We got 16 or 17 here in Greenwich, and it's nothing like I've seen.

It was just a constant day of clearing it up. There was so much snow. There's still so much snow.

There were parts of New Jersey, and Connecticut, and Long Island.

They got 30 inches. That's two and a half feet.

I just can't comprehend what two and a half, three foot of snow is like.

16, 17 inches was enough.

It makes you want to just duck under the covers and not leave it.

It's awful, especially like you said.

We can't do that.

We've got two small kids who just tear up your house.

Who you have to feed?

Oh, man, it's been a trying few days. It really has.

Can you believe that the newspaper, 153 years, the first time?

That's not blew me away.

That's horrible. I think everyone is sick of it.

We have to.

We're wrapping up February. I think this episode will be out next week, right?

Beginning of March.

I am so hopeful, praying.

What did you say that spring is all its way?

Well, the good news is, I don't know where you are, but there's more snow scheduled for us next week.

Yeah.

Okay, right.

That's what we're doing as you might say for the episode, right?

I'm just getting warmed up. What are you talking about? I'm just getting started.

Well, let's talk about the biggest news item I think in the last week or so,

which is a Supreme Court walking back.

The Trump's tariffs or the way he's imposed tariffs was legal.

Wow.

And what feels like it in any other timeline would be a conclusion or an end state for the question that seems to have opened up a lot more uncertainties, right?

The question of refunds is on top of everyone's mind right now.

Who gets it? When and how?

He responded by announcing more tariffs, right? So he certainly sticking to the theme.

I'm attacking the just, just as it's personally, that was quite something.

That was arguably not very presidential.

Shock horror.

That's putting it as politely as possible.

Yeah.

Although last night was the state of the Union address.

I didn't watch it, but I read about it this morning, and it seems that he's walked back.

I'll tone down some sort of the appropriate shook hands with the justices on the word that were in attendance on the way in.

Thank goodness and goodness.

But yeah, who knows what next? It was quite a quite a reaction.

Yeah.

It, you know, I think we always talk about this idea that markets in general don't like uncertainty, right?

And we certainly had a lot of that over the last year or so.

Do you see any way away from that?

You see, I just can't imagine any, any place we get to within the next six months or in the short term where we feel like we know what's happening and what's around the next quarter.

Do we ever know?

No, probably not.

Obviously, that's massively heightened now.

But I tell you, if you ever do feel that you have a tight grip on what's going on in you, then you're deluding yourself.

Yeah.

There's just too, too much going on.

And there's too many unknowns and too many can't possibly know.

No one knows what's, you know, we can have faith the further you look out.

I think the more confident you can be.

But in the moment, and I stand by that, but I do also agree what you're saying is particularly chaotic right now.

And, and sentiment, certainly among consumers is in the absolute dumps right now.

I don't think anyone feels very confident.

But to your point, what kind of actionable advice does that lead to?

Right? It's one thing to feel uncertain or feel, you know, confused or worried.

What can we do about it or where can we discuss?

I do think a lot of that on these is AI driven faith.

Do you hear about this blog post that went viral?

I just read about this morning.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I read about that.

I've actually seen reading it last night.

It's pretty dire.

It's all hypothetical though.

But I think people are really, really on edge about AI, what it means for the immediate term.

I think people are both excited about what this could mean, but also kind of fearful.

It does feel like, and this is purely anecdotal, right?

But it feels like that early stage optimism in 2022, 2023, maybe 2024, has shifted.

Yes.

Pretty markedly, right?

Yes.

From optimism to, okay, what does this actually mean, you know, in short to medium term?

Right.

That blog was a piece of fiction.

Let's not lie.

I could it happen, obviously, but it's pure speculation.

You know, we come back to this idea of optimism.

Even when it's difficult to hold those views, you know, it is important to understand

that human ingenuity and the response to these things, try to hold out hope, right?

And try to understand that any kind of technological improvement comes with as bumps and disruptions

as the term is known on the street in Palo Alto.

You have to hope that the human spirit, human ingenuity, persistence, drive, will see us through, right?

And things might look different, but we certainly don't want an audience feeling hopeless.

I actually think I try to agree that entirely.

And I actually think the best proponents of that is America.

And I know there's a lot of chat about America being overvalued or historically high valued

and dependent on the behemoths, although that's the rotation going on there, absolutely.

But I think America has proven itself over the last entry to be the singular best country

at harnessing human ingenuity for profit.

And I can be taken to excess and it's not all good yet, but broad strokes.

That's why I fundamentally still think America is the best place to invest for the next.

Yep, for the long term.

No idea what's happening in the short term, but for the long term, I still think the countries that will harness this,

the best, will find a way to make themselves and people everyone around them

and the country and society richer will be America.

There will be massive inequality.

That's a massive, that is such a problem that needs to be dealt with.

I do think that.

But the action isn't America still, I think.

And importantly, not investing exclusively in the US, right?

We believe that, or I do anyway, the US as a powerhouse and certainly has been,

when that narrative changes as it did in 2025 and in 2026,

when XUS is outstripping using the S&P as a shorthand, you know, orders of magnitude,

there's a reason to be diverse.

Of course, sorry, that absolutely goes without saying.

And I'm not for one second advocating all America.

But the problem, the narrative is always so extreme, isn't it?

It's for the last 15 years, nothing but America.

And suddenly it changed on a dime and everyone's shifting into the rest of the world.

And I'm not saying I'm not advocating for that at all.

I'm advocating for always being diversified.

And not like suddenly declaring, right, we're finished with America, let's do Europe.

We're finishing Europe, let's go back to America.

Not at all.

But America has been on an absolute tear.

But I still think this is whether the action is in terms of AI and maximizing that potential.

Yeah, let's hope so.

Yes, let's hope so.

We have a new Fed Chairman incoming as well.

That's an interesting, no, I don't think anyone's surprised.

I don't think it's necessarily a bad pick.

Steven Wash.

He seems to have the bonafines.

I don't think he's a pure political hack.

He likes really those who would be suggested.

So I'd be kind of glad.

I think Powell's been a great Fed Chairman.

But there's so much circus around him now.

Yeah, yeah.

So much controversy.

Not his doing.

I think he's in a great job.

But you'll be, as long as this guy doesn't turn into a political hack,

doesn't turn into just an act like a lap dog will in to do whatever the boss wants,

then I think hopefully that could be a good call.

Isn't it funny?

We talk about the sentiment around AI, right?

We feel that shift or certainly in the media.

Same thing with the Fed, right?

Maybe not necessarily negative.

But in 2025, the Fed was a dominant news story again and again and again, right?

And in some ways, that's not the most forward thinking position, right?

I'm sure federal reserve officials would rather be someone in the background, right?

And it shouldn't be this political circus like it's been.

So I can absolutely echo the feeling that there will be some sense of relief that that continues, right?

That there is a functioning.

Absolutely.

Although I would say the Fed has changed years ago.

You didn't hear from the Fed at all.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Then you had the taciturn green span.

And I think this was kind of before my time.

But I believe trying to decipher what he said was an art form in itself.

And then we've had Bernanke and Janet Yellen.

And now we have the very plain speaking Jim Powell.

But all the other Fed chairs are out there talking.

All the comrades here.

I think it's a very different, a very different beast to what it was.

I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, honestly.

And is that supplier demand?

Because I think there's something to be said about a media that once they know these stories get clicks, right?

Some governor and Ohio is saying something about where you see rates to be, you know, in six months or nine months.

Does it mean anything in the moment note?

Does it get eyeballs?

Absolutely.

Is it useful?

Probably not, frankly.

But, you know, it is something that is certainly different than it was 20 years ago, right?

You never heard from Fedgo.

And that was by design.

Never.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, interesting times.

Right.

Should we just talk quickly about the last, well, not the last episode.

An episode recently I did with Tobias Gleed Owens, where we talked about inheritance taxes coming to UK pensions, including Sips.

From April 20, 20, 7, that much we know.

And this is going to affect a lot of expats with large Sips.

And there's a lot of expats in America with large Sips.

And Tobias came on and he thinks there may be, oh, he thinks there is potentially a way to avoid it by investing in non-UK Citus investments.

So, for us obviously it would be US ETF mutual funds.

He believes that that should put the value of those assets outside of the scope of UK inheritance tax.

Now, this could have serious savings for the heirs of British expats who got some central Sips.

Like, tens hundreds of thousands of pounds, such dollars.

So, this is unsurprisingly generated quite a bit of interest from our clients and listeners.

This is one person we've had on talk about.

I've not had this collaborated by anyone else.

I've also got no reason to doubt it.

But we don't even have the final rules yet.

The inheritance tax on UK pensions doesn't come in force until April 20, 20, 7.

So, I don't think there's any massive urgency anyone.

So, we've received quite a few people reaching out to us about this.

And I think our message has been like, we're watching this.

We're putting out feelers to the different pension providers trying to understand what their positions are, what their options are.

There's no action to take right now, I don't think.

But we're looking into it, we're working on it, we're seeing how this evolves and develops.

Yes, yes, we've gotten a lot of interest on this and questions.

And people kind of scrambling because it is a massive shift for virtually forever pensions didn't fall under IHT.

And now they will to our understanding of the rules.

It does kind of dovetail into something that we call income planning.

When we think about segueing from an accumulation phase, from working and earning an income into now distribution, when you're going to start taking withdrawals from your investments.

For a long time, we've taken the position that if you're in the US, your non-US assets likely should be drawn down on first.

Right, a SIP is a great example of that.

For a lot of reasons, for reporting complexity, for tax questions, usually just made sense to draw those assets first.

Simplify your financial life that way.

This in my mind is even more credence to that approach, to potentially look at drawing down your SIP first rather than looking at US or domestic investments.

Certainly, that's a blunt tool, right? But that's one way to mitigate some of that concern.

But we did also have clients who had some substantial assets in SIP.

Or we do have clients who have got substantial assets in SIP, who were choosing to take a different route, which was to leave them untouched because of gross roll-up.

But also because they were outside the UK inheritance tax net.

So for those clients, the particularly large ones, the calculus has shifted somewhat.

It's one of those things I had a conversation with recently with a client.

I would expect not everyone here in my accent, not being familiar with the UK legal system,

certainly in how this might get challenged by HMRC and the IHT collection.

I would imagine there's going to be some pretty significant contests in the courts, right?

Or determinations of what is covered and what's not.

It's non-UK down the solid assets.

Does it look through the SIP wrapper?

All the things that we discussed on that episode, if you haven't listened to it, I certainly recommend it.

And I'm eager to see clarity on that, right, to get an understanding of where the field lays.

Because, like you say, for someone with significant assets in these vehicles,

it is a charge that we had never anticipated, right?

That is a very real potential threat now.

So I have seen pretty confident that it was supported.

It wasn't just spun out of hold-puff.

It was very much fit within the spirit of the rules and UK sidestats and non-UK sidestats.

So you seem pretty confident in it.

I think a key element will be getting the buy-in, getting the agreement of the SIP trustees.

Because on-deaf is the SIP trustees who will also report back to HMRC.

And Tobias was very clear, you want your, whoever's dealing with it,

the ex-secondary of your estate will be reporting to HMRC.

And the trustee of the SIP will be reporting to HMRC.

And you want them reporting the same thing.

You want to be on the same page.

And if you're not, that will be a problem.

So I think that's going to be critical.

But one of the jobs we're doing right now is we're reaching out to the trustees,

trying to understand their position and their take and go from there.

But we have time.

Yeah. I can hear the questions flooding in right now, right?

The partners you work with, the platforms you work with,

trustees, custodians, what are the zero position?

We don't know yet, right?

But it's something we're actively working on.

And we'll only grow on importance, like you say.

Yeah.

Cool, right?

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What a nightmare.

My notepads close on me.

What have we got next?

Did you hear my attempt at a segue earlier?

Were you bringing up income planning?

Oh, no, yeah, I did.

I just turned the car around, did I?

This is a major topic that I don't think, you know,

we always think about what we want to cover, what questions we get from clients

or prospective clients, topics that are top of mind.

This is something we have not covered yet in the podcast.

To my knowledge, really, at all.

And it's what we call income planning, right?

That very notion that I just mentioned going from what we call accumulation to

de-cumulation, right?

So accumulation, you're working, you have an income, you have earnings coming in,

you're saving into pensions or investment accounts.

That shifts, obviously, when you step away from work, when that income stops.

A pretty critical point when we think about what does financial planning mean?

What does retirement planning mean?

Is income planning?

Is determining the path and plan for how you generate income?

You derive income from this nest egg you've built up throughout your working career.

It is critical.

And if you get it wrong, you either in the least worst case scenarios,

you're leaving money on the table, right?

In the worst case scenarios, you're potentially derailing what would have been a successful retirement.

It's not something that we always talk about immediately, right?

We tend to say two to five years, maybe, and five years might be long

before stepping away from work to get this income plan into place.

But it's something as you approach retirement, you should be thinking about

and should be concocting a plan for.

Well, can you put a stake in the ground here and make some really clear

that you touched on?

There are two broadly, there are two phases in so on to financial life.

Accumulation and decumulation.

And to be clear, most financial planners in my experience exist

to help people with a decumulation.

And I stress that, not family offices, that's a whole different thing.

When you get above a certain level of wealth, there's a different calculus going on.

But for most of us regular folk, you have accumulation and decumulation.

Financial advisors can help a lot in accumulation, but they really exist for decumulation.

And the reason I bring this up is because a lot of people are in the accumulation phase.

The working phase, you're in your 20s, 30s, even 40s.

You're working hard, you're saving, you've got your 401k, your 529s.

You're worried about powerfully mortgage, you're worried about putting your kids through college.

And I think all you're saving is, or hopefully, is automated.

Going into low-cost index funds.

And a lot of people think, why would I have an unilateral advisor like this is easy?

Yeah, it is.

And look, sometimes you could definitely benefit from a financial advisor.

The benefit, there's true value to know if you're on track.

Because if you're off track and you leave it too late, there's no recovery.

Whereas if you're off track and you have a decade or two to catch up,

there's a lot that can be done.

And two often people come to us and say, right, I'm on the customer retirement.

What can I do?

And you're like, oh, well, we have got there's fewer levers that we can pull.

And that I can often lead to some difficult conversations,

working longer, reducing lateral expectations.

But in general, accumulation is relatively straightforward.

And people often scratch their head thinking, what would I need a financial advisor for?

Why would I pay someone to help me with this?

And although I will just caveat that.

As always, I know you're all sick of hearing me say this.

But if you're a cross-border, you need a good tax advisor.

Absolutely.

Have a good cross-border tax person do your returns.

Please, please, please.

It will save you.

Oodles of stress and likely some real hard currency in the long run.

But decommulation is very different.

When you stop earning, when you stop having a regular income stream or two that pays your bills,

that gives you that financial security,

that means that when the market goes up and down, you don't freak out because you're not living off that pot of money.

Worrying about making that thing last.

That, that, that, that, that, a valuation of assets you've got last for 30, 40 years of relentlessly rising prices.

That is stressful. It is scary. It is hard.

Um, it's fraud or dangers.

It's an enormous psychological shift, right?

It's enormous psychological shift.

And compounded by the life, life change itself, right?

You know, you, you see those charts, everyone's wrong,

that are like most stressful occurrences, events in someone's life,

changing jobs, changing house, moving houses, death of parents, that kind of thing.

Snowing.

Snowing.

Snow, snow.

Um, February in general.

February.

Retirement is one of those major changes, right?

It's a pretty significant shift to go from a structured routine work, you know,

challenges every day, problems to solve to potentially not that, right?

To something very different.

So you have this sort of lifestyle change,

if you will, lifestyle shift.

And now you're also completely shifting how you're handling your finances, right?

How that nest egg, like you said, needs to now generate that income, right?

Needs to provide a lifestyle that you hope to continue throughout retirement

without the fear of running out of it, right?

Without a running out of money.

Um, it's, it's two enormous shifts that echo each other, right?

They're amplifying each other.

Yeah.

So what do we want to say about what we do?

Are we approaching, complaining?

I think there's a systematic.

Yeah.

There's a lot that could be said here.

If we can keep it high level, we look at a couple different things.

Number one, a cash buffer, right?

With our clients, we're looking at between one to two years of living expenses,

ideally, depending where you fall from a risk tolerance perspective.

And then we look at order of operations, right?

If you will, from which accounts are we drawing from first and why, right?

We're discussing the pros and cons of doing each of those things.

I hinted at earlier the idea of drawing down from non-US assets first, right?

For, for a lot of reasons, simplifying your, your finances being one of them,

your taxes, potentially now this, this IHT issue as well, right?

So if I can sketch out kind of basics of the, of the income plan that we are building for our clients,

it's some cash buffer, a war chest, right?

That's going to provide income for the next 12 to 24 months.

Then it's an order of operations that might look like for a lot of our audience,

drawing down your SIP, right? First, then we start to look at US accounts.

Tax will brokerage, usually going to be the first stop there,

because there's tax drag on those accounts, right?

You're getting taxed every year on dividends, capital gains, all those things.

Although we do try to reduce out the tax list, obviously.

Yeah, absolutely. There's a lot working in sync with this.

Beyond that, then typically it will be a pre-tax account like an IRA or 401K,

and then finally your Roth IRA.

There's a lot of nuance there, right? And these plans are...

And along the way, we're likely paying our one-year retire,

and if you're still working, we'll look to do some Roth conversions early on,

build up that Roth bucket, and get that growing tax-free,

and then later tax-free withdrawals as well.

We'll be doing tax loss harvesting along the way,

and depending on your portfolio and account size,

maybe look to do some direct indexing to really juice that tax loss harvesting approach.

So we really do have an eye on taxes as well.

So there's the order of operations.

There's the continual monitoring of this to make sure your expenses are in line

with what we expect, and if not what we do about that.

And also, you're not going to run out of money.

Yeah.

Yeah, I simply put, like, projecting forward all the time,

making sure that no matter what happens, you're going to be okay.

And you know you're going to be okay, and then you can live confidently,

knowing you're going to be okay, and your way of life is protected.

That's massively important.

That idea of not running out of money, then there's the flip side, right?

A lot of our clients are in this position.

I'm sure a lot of the audience where we also want you to have the confidence

to live the lifestyle you want, and that's supportable by the plan.

We don't want you to leave life on the table, right?

Yes.

Yes.

We will encourage our clients to spend when they can to do that trip,

to buy that car, to help the kids out in the housing leather.

Whatever it is, we want people to live their lives.

And throughout this, tax, tax, tax.

Now, at that point, I know I'm going to run out of tax all the time.

A lot of my bleeding is about urging people who are in the accumulation phase

to work the cross-border tax advisor to get into and stay in compliance.

What we're talking about here is a bit different.

By the time we get to decumulation, hopefully if you're working with us,

you're in compliance.

But now, the taxes are, I presume, a massive part of your life growth so far.

But now, I'll likely be the single biggest line item, as well, still in retirement.

So we want to do everything we can to minimise that through tax bus harvesting,

through rough conversions, which is through regular ongoing annual maintenance and checks.

And this is where we really, I'm going to talk about the service we've introduced in the last couple of years,

which is where we will work with select tax advisors to do a level of tax planning

for our decumulation clients to make sure they remain in compliance.

They don't have that risk hanging over them, which some people do.

But also, then, to minimise the tax bill, they have to pay each and every year in retirement.

So they get to keep more and enjoy more.

And ultimately, maybe pass more on to their family.

Absolutely.

It's almost a layer, you know, a lens of tax optimisation, right?

That sort of overlays on all of these moving parts.

And I know, you know, we just ran through that in 10 minutes, right?

We threw out a lot of acronyms there.

James, I just want to spend on this for one more second.

And the reason is because everyone talks about their financial advisor and their tax advisor,

you know, working in co-hosts, be having a relationship, but it never happens.

Yeah.

It never happens.

I don't even know if it happens to these firms where they have it in house.

Maybe it does.

But in my experience, even when the tax advisor and the financial advisor know each other,

there's no real coordination.

There's no real planning.

And it's wow me up for years.

So what we've instigated is when our clients work with these particular cross-border firms,

we will pay separately for a level of planning.

And we get together with the client, with the tax advisor, and we go through everything.

And clients get to see, oh, my financial advisor and my tax advisor here,

my financial planner, my tax advisor, they are have a relationship.

They are talking about me.

They are planning about me.

It is a strategic planning symbiotic relationship with the objective,

one dream compliance of making sure you pay as little tax as possible.

And I think as rudimentary, as simple as that sounds, I think it's pretty unique.

It's missing almost always.

Yeah.

We always find that and we're doing everything we can to fix that, right?

To fill that gap because it is so critical.

Like you said earlier, I know sometimes people get sick of us talking about tax,

but it really does impact and influence every step of a financial plan, right?

Of an income plan, of an investment plan.

It is there always.

So we always want to be diligent, right?

Vigilant, I should say, diligent, and make sure that your teas are crossed,

your eyes are dotted, and you're looking ahead and really using that advanced tax plan.

Yeah.

Forward tax plan.

Absolutely.

We want to be proactive, exactly.

Forward looking tax planning.

Yeah.

It's really good.

Sorry.

I introduced you mid-flow there.

I'm sure that whatever I was going to say was you were, you had a better point.

So it's completely flew out of my mind.

Oh, tell you one thing.

Do we have anything else on that?

Or can we wrap up?

I think that's, we can wrap that up.

Okay.

Well, cool.

Let's, let's, we have a development for our firm development.

Yes.

We hired Kenny in the first, in February.

I think we, we have James now has a client servicing associate who actually is shaping

up to be a whole lot more, which is great.

But he's been brought on board to help James with his existing clients and his new clients,

which is growing fantastic well by the best arts and new business ever.

You know, I think this is our eighth year, maybe our ninth.

So that's great news.

And we brought Kenny on to help us grow both bringing on clients.

But as I mentioned, I think he's going to do a bit more, which is, which is great.

We're absolutely right direction.

We are, we are so happy to have Connie on board.

We stuck to the global, the cross-border theme.

He actually has experience working at an Australian financial planning firm.

And he's, he's, he's, he's dived right in.

So we're really happy to have him.

Have him on the team.

All right.

Wrap up anything else to add before we can move on to pick a mix.

I'll still it.

Okay.

Well, let you go first.

Tell me what you, what, what's, what's, what's showing in the world?

This will be a good, a good segue from our previous episode.

Because I'm actually reading a recommendation by one of our hosts.

1929 by Andrew all sorkin about the, the, the depression.

Obviously in the year 2029 with the stock market falling by halfway through a really enjoying it.

And you could tell.

He's good.

He's great writer.

And do you get the sense that this is written for the screen?

I don't mean that in a pejorative way.

Oh, it's written very cinematically.

And I would be shocked if there is not a Hollywood movie or, or an HBO limited series of this in a couple of years.

I didn't, I didn't think of that, but I'm sure.

I'd love to see if it, if that is out on HBO, I would be the first to watch it.

Yeah.

Uh, did you ever read too big to fail?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They made that into a movie, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Can't remember it, but yeah, it's very, very, very good.

I'm glad you're reading that.

Yeah.

I'm still reading the, if only they spoke a different language book about Trump's America by a British journalist.

It's okay.

It's good.

I've enjoyed it.

I'm ready for it to end now.

So I've got my start.

I've got a Genghis Khan book lined up.

I'm ready to get started on that.

But I'm so knackered at the moment every time I go to sleep.

I get about one page in the fall asleep reading everything on the night.

So it's excruciatingly slow.

I have to tell you, I usually are used to read every night without fail.

I have fallen.

I don't know if there's a bad habit or not, but I've been falling asleep to podcasts now,

which is, which is cut into my reading.

I still read in the mornings, but I have found the same thing where I don't have two little

kids that run after, but it's still still tired at the end of the long day.

I will listen to 60 seconds of a podcast, and I'm asleep.

I'm out like a lot.

Well, what was your able to do?

I'm in the bed.

For some reason, it stays.

And I think also sometimes I'll kind of wake up and take it out.

It's just going on a nightstand.

But yeah, I've never, I've never actually lost one yet.

What are you listening to at night?

Usually it's like pretty lighthearted comedy podcast, comedians kind of chatting.

It's nothing ever.

I can't listen to any kind of news, certainly.

Do you, do you follow the ThioVon podcast?

No, no, that's not for me.

He strikes me as quite funny.

Yeah.

But some of the, some of the people on there, you know, it's not my cup of tea.

Not my, not my ecosystem necessarily.

For our listeners, I think I've talked about them many times.

There's a podcast called Off Menu in the UK that's enormous.

It's hosted by James A. Kessler, stand up comedian, another comedian called Ed Gamble.

It is fantastic.

And the best episodes are when it's another British comedian that you could tell they're really

good buddies with.

And they just really for love it.

I've been, I've been listening to that for years.

Wait, what was I need to get?

What's that called?

It's called Off Menu.

Off Menu.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, I'm, I'm, my recommendation podcast is a Goldhanger podcast called The Only Way is Politics.

Oh, sorry.

The rest is politics in US.

And to Sky Moochie and Katty K, I, I, I, I enjoy listening to it and it's a good update

what's going on.

Off Menu.

Yeah, I'm following this.

I'm going to listen to this.

I need some light on it.

Oh, my podcast are all heavy.

Speaking of, I'll shout another one.

It's called What Did You Do Yesterday?

It's, it's similar story, a Dublin-based comedian, Dan Dockery, and there's a British sports

commentator whose name, Max, Max Rushden, I think his name is.

I don't know him.

But he's got two young kids and they literally just go through their day, you know, hour

by hour.

I would imagine you, you, you'd either feel a lot of empathy for him or you have flashbacks

like PTSD flashbacks, but not a good, I don't like this one.

Both follow.

I could do with some like podcasting minds, all economic investment news, which is politics

and history.

Yeah.

I see, I have trouble turning my brain off into that, but more power to you.

Yeah.

Anything on TV worth watching?

Industry.

We've kept up with.

I know.

I think you bailed out of that one.

This is an HBO.

About on the second season.

Yeah.

I think it's an HBO BBC co-production type thing set in London completely over the top, completely

bombastic, but entertaining, very entertaining.

The show has evolved quite a bit.

They brought on Game of Thrones actor, played John Snow.

He's kind of like one of the main leads now.

You guys say, get out of the town.

Get out of the town.

That's it.

That's it.

Very over the time.

You know nothing, John Snow.

I don't know.

I don't know.

He's very good in the role.

He plays this kind of like down and out, sort of mentally unstable, nepo baby, inheritor,

sort of upper class, yeah, British Lordling.

So he is something of aristocracy, you know, yeah.

So maybe that's where he can draw from that well.

He does it.

It's great performance.

Oh, really?

I like him.

I enjoy Game of Thrones.

You know nothing, John Snow.

I like it.

Yeah.

I'm watching the BBC adaptation from a few years ago of War and Peace.

Ah, very nice.

And it's a very good adaptation, but if you read the book, the book is too big to condense

into even a mini-series, but it's got some great actors in it, Paul Deino, James Cromington

think of his name.

Happy Valley actor.

Great actor.

Oh, George.

Do I know that Ireland?

No, he's great as well.

Yeah.

I know I have.

I can't think of his name.

Oh, he's going to really annoy me.

But he's great.

It's a really, it's a great adaptation, but you just can't fit everything from that book

into a program.

It's just too big.

Imagine the job of a screenwriter who has to read that book and then figure out how to

fit it into a, I don't know, an eight episode mini-series or six episodes mini-series.

Yeah.

Right.

Are we done?

I think so.

We always echo, appreciate the audience listening, follow us where you find your podcasts.

And if you have any questions, like we say, we want the remit of this style of the episodes

here for X-Pat Wealth to be responsive to our audience's questions.

So send them in.

You know, we really appreciate the engagement and want to make this cater to the people

listen.

Yeah.

So if we've got signals, which is the episode on Sips, we just got a day loose of people

reach out to us, then we'll bring that up.

But don't be afraid to come out of this with questions queries and maybe we can build

a segment around that.

Absolutely.

And if you're thinking, if you're listening to this and thinking of questions that

occur to you, that means probably there's dozens or a very large group of people who are

also thinking about it, but once and the question is, so don't be shy because we definitely

see these themes and, like we said, we want to help what we can.

Absolutely.

Excellent.

All right, James, thank you very much.

And I shall see you soon.

Here's the spring.

Cheers Richard.

Here's the spring.

Yeah.

Okay.

Bye bye.

All right, folks.

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