EIS: don’t buy just for the tax breaks

Don’t rush into an EIS for tax reasons, says David Prosser. Judge the underlying investments.

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Not something you'll find in your EIS
(Image credit: Credit: Anna Stowe / Alamy Stock Photo)

The Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) should be more popular than ever. Offering generous tax reliefsto long-term savers with relatively deep pockets, the EIS is an obvious alternative for wealthy savers running up against lower annual caps on private pension contributions. Yet despite this, the number of people investing in the EIS fell by more than 15% in the 2016-2017 tax year.

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David Prosser
Business Columnist

David Prosser is a regular MoneyWeek columnist, writing on small business and entrepreneurship, as well as pensions and other forms of tax-efficient savings and investments. David has been a financial journalist for almost 30 years, specialising initially in personal finance, and then in broader business coverage. He has worked for national newspaper groups including The Financial Times, The Guardian and Observer, Express Newspapers and, most recently, The Independent, where he served for more than three years as business editor.