The 2027AnnualInvestor Report.
An independent annual report for the UK self-directed investor. Ungated. No registration required. Forward freely.
What's changed in 2025-26
The twelve months covered by this edition reshaped the tax architecture more than any year since 2014's pension freedoms.
Seven landscape changes anchor the chapters that follow.
- 1
BPR cap raised twice through the year
Chapter 6
Autumn Budget 2024 (30 October 2024) announced a £1m cap on business-property relief. HMT raised it to £2.5m (combined APR + BPR per estate, spouse-transferable to £5m) on 23 December 2025. Effective 6 April 2026.
- 2
April 2027 pension change
Chapter 5
From 6 April 2027, defined-contribution pension pots fall inside the estate for IHT. OBR cost approximately £1.5bn by 2029-30.
- 3
Nil-rate-band freeze extended to April 2031
Chapter 5
Autumn Budget 2025 added two further years.
- 4
VCT relief drops from 30 to 20 percent
Chapter 4
From 6 April 2026. Subscriptions to 5 April 2026 retain the 30 percent rate.
- 5
UK CGT annual exemption at £3,000
Chapter 4
Halved from £6,000 in tax year 2024-25.
- 6
Sterling-gold £2,500-£2,600 spot through late 2025
Chapter 2
From roughly £780 per ounce a decade ago. Approximately 220 percent rise in GBP terms.
- 7
The advice gap documented in the FCA's own research
Chapter 2
Schroders 2025 UK Adviser Survey: adviser willingness to serve sub-£50,000 clients fell from 52 percent in 2019 to 25 percent in 2025.
Foreword excerpt
From the report.
"The UK self-directed investor with £500,000 or more in liquid wealth holds it across more accounts than they can easily tally. An ISA at one platform, a SIPP at another, a defined-contribution pot from a former employer, an alternatives allocation tracked in a spreadsheet, a property estimate that has not been refreshed since the last rate move, and the residual cash position that grew through 2024 and 2025 because the rest of the portfolio offered no clear place to add."
Opening paragraph · Foreword · 2027 Annual Investor Report
Chapter summary
Seven chapters across six structural problems plus the closing answer.
- 01
Visibility
The UK self-directed investor cannot see their full position. Holdings sit across ISA platform, SIPP, defined-contribution pension pots, GIA, property estimate, alternatives spreadsheet, cash accounts. Decisions are made on partial data.
- 02
The advice gap, with the performance evidence
Three of the best-performing investment categories of the last decade sit outside what UK regulated advice can recommend. Physical gold at £2,500-£2,600 spot. Bitcoin around £77,000 average through 2025. EIS-funded private companies at median IRRs between 12 and 17 percent.
- 03
Concentration, with the 60/40 evidence
A £2m illustrative composite runs 57 percent property exposure, 81 percent UK-economy exposure, 67 percent illiquid. The 60/40 stock-bond correlation since 2022 made concentration more dangerous; the partial 2023-2025 reversion has not restored the prior-decade negative correlation.
- 04
The HMRC schemes
EIS, SEIS, VCTs, BPR-qualifying assets, ISAs, pensions. EIS gets meaningful space (income tax relief at 30 percent, CGT deferral, IHT relief at 100 percent after two years under business-relief rules). From 6 April 2026 the EIS company-level limits double.
- 05
April 2027: the pension change and what it does to IHT exposure
From 6 April 2027, DC pension pots fall inside the estate for IHT. The arithmetic on a £500,000 DC pension at an estate at the £325,000 nil-rate band: £200,000 of additional IHT becomes payable, against £0 under the prior rule. Three responses: drawdown, partial BPR conversion, do-nothing.
- 06
The £2.5m BPR cap
Above the combined APR + BPR allowance, IHT relief halves from 100 percent to 50 percent. The threshold is £2.5m per estate; £5m on a per-couple basis through spousal transfer. Worked arithmetic on £2m, £3m, and £5m holdings.
End of report
The six chapters above are the EnterpriseUK Research report for the 2027 annual edition. They were written and edited as the editorial body of the report. The single chapter that follows is included because the operational layer it describes is the answer to the structural problems the six chapters above diagnose. The reader who wants the report alone can stop here without missing the report.
- 07
The platform answer to the prior six chapters
The closing chapter walks the operational layer the prior six chapters described as missing. It is the chapter the reader who came for the editorial diagnosis can skip; it is the chapter the reader who came for the operational answer can read first.
Sponsor disclosure
Unlock, the UK HNW investor intelligence platform, is the proud sponsor of the 2027 EnterpriseUK Annual Investor Report. Editorial sits independent of the sponsor. The Unlock sponsor section is contained to Chapter 7, preceded by the end-of-report rule and the editor's note above. Chapter 7 names the platform answer that operationalises a response to the six structural problems the editorial chapters diagnose.
Methodology and sources
How this report was produced.
The 2027 edition draws on HM Treasury Autumn Budgets 2024 and 2025, the 2025-26 Finance Bill, the OBR supplementary release on IHT on pension wealth, HMRC published guidance (Inheritance Tax Manual, Capital Gains Manual, EIS Guidance, HS393 SEIS reliefs 2025), London Bullion Market Association PM Fix and Exchange Rates.org sterling-denominated price series, the Schroders 2025 UK Financial Adviser Survey via IFA Magazine, FCA Financial Lives 2024 and Understanding Financial Advice Market 2025, industry-estimate sources for EIS vintage IRR ranges (Seedrs, BVCA, EISA commentary), the Long Angle 2026 HNW asset allocation benchmark, the Bank of England working paper on the 2022 gilt market crisis, and Vanguard UK stock-bond correlation analysis. Inline source footnotes carry on every figure.
From the 2028 edition onward EnterpriseUK Research is commissioning original survey data from an independent UK fieldwork provider.