Tag: Investing

The Top Ten Best Investments You Will Ever Make


The Top Ten Best Investments You Will Ever Make

An Essay on Wealth, Time, and the Architecture of a Life

We spend much of adulthood thinking about “investments” — the ones we should have made, the ones we regret, the ones we hope will finally deliver. But the truth is that the highest‑yield investments are rarely the ones your bank manager talks about. They are the ones that compound across decades, protect your future, and shape the lives of the people you love.

This is not a list of financial products. It is a list of the ten most powerful ways a human being can invest in their future — in money, in time, in health, and in eternity.

Most of these assume that you have cleared any interest-bearing debts, and that you want to create a stor of wealt so that loved ones can have ongoing security after your own upgrade. The final one is about the actual upgrade.

None of this is personal financial advice and so you can’t sue me for anything. If you want some good advice, you should find a properly licensed accountant in each of the jurisdictions where you have a footprint. Usually that will be money well spent.

10. Your Home

A house is more than a structure. It is the anchor of your life: the place where your children grow, where your memories accumulate, where your identity settles. Financially, it is the quiet compounding engine that works even when you are not paying attention. Inflation lifts it. Scarcity protects it. And unlike most assets, you can live inside it.
A home that you love and a place you can feel safe and well is a baseline for many other of life’s good things.

A house is the first investment that teaches you the difference between price and value.

For most people, especially of an Anglo-Saxon mindset, the home is the biggest investment that they knowingly make, but in fact it is ony number ten on my list here today.

In many countries mortgage lending is the cheapest form of lending and also come with tax incentives, however one still has to avoid making basic errors around the mortgage loan. Such as, taking so-called “endowment” or “interest-only” mortgages, or mortgages framed in a currency which you have no natural hedge for, such as the swiss franc mortgages that used to be popular in Poland.

9. Land

Land is permanence in a world of flux. It feeds you, shelters you, and — if you are fortunate — gives you beauty. It is the original store of value, the asset that predates markets, currencies, and governments. Land is the one investment that connects you to the centuries.

I separated out land from home as people also have homes without land if they live in flats, as living with no actual land suits some people down to the ground. However owing a house iwth the land under it gives and additional layer of security, and also on land you can invest in such vital life protecting oinvestments as wells, fruit trees, poultry, things that keep your family going in times of dearth.

If there is over-population and shortage of land, its value raises. Where the population falls, land’s value also falls, but you still have a thing of beauty and peace which is a refuge and a connection with nature.

Both land and buildings, however, invlove sizeable costs to maintain properly, and having too much of either, more than one can reasonably handle is a classic error. Some of the advice Buffett and other very rich men offer is not to overdo the land and buildings that they buy purely for their own use. (what falls under point 7 below is anoher matter)

8. ETFs and Other Traded Investments

The modern world’s most democratic wealth‑building tool. Low‑cost, diversified, and relentlessly compounding. ETFs are not glamorous, but they are faithful. They reward patience, discipline, and the refusal to panic.

They are the financial equivalent of planting trees: you do the work once, and the growth happens quietly for decades.

One can of course buy the equities direct. This is generally more expensive and involves more work to get a portfolio that behaves the way you hope. Fewer assets in the portfolio is always more risky.

Gold has recently outpermoed the Stock Exchanges of the world because of its recent high. Let me tell you that this is probably likely to go the other way in coming years and now is a very bad time to buy that metal. If you already had it and can sell at a high price, you were unusually lucky.

Crypto-assets and other derivative investments where there is no underlying business are a pure Ponzi scheme and no wise money will be found in them.

Unlike land and buildings, investments in equities whether directly or though ETFs are scalable in that you can build as big a portfolio as you like. The value can go down as well as up. In the long-term, it generally goes up.

7. Business Assets That Work for You

A business that earns while you sleep is the modern watermill. It turns labour into leverage and time into freedom. Whether it is a guesthouse, a consultancy, a farm, or a digital product, a business asset is a machine that converts your ideas into income. However, the best ones are ones you don’t sleep over, but manage in a hands-on way.

It is the investment that teaches you the difference between working for money and money working for you.

The best business assets are ones which you can overlook, and ones where your own knowledge and skills can be brought to bear by having them. A person with a trucker’s license gets more utility form buying his own truck that a person can get who buys one to hire out to a trucker, but cannot actually drive it himself. The best business assets shold be scalable, but also controllable.

A social benefit of this kind of investment is that it provides jobs for people who need them, and if you are very lucky you may receive some gratitude. However, the reality is that if a business is to be successful is needs a degree of commitment form employees, and not everyone is able to inspire this commitment without being taken for a bloodsucking slavedriving capitalist exploiter of the masses, so be warned.

Business assets can be a useful way to invest in times of economic distress, when cash is king. In order to do that you need good education (see point 5) and a store of cash ready. Then if you are at the right place at the right time, you can get some of the best bargains in your life, but it’s always good to take a good hard look at things, as there is often a reason beyond simple cash-flow issues why the assets is for sale at that price.

6. Art and Culture

Not every return is measured in currency. Some investments enrich the soul, sharpen the mind, and connect you to the centuries. Art is civilisation’s memory. Culture is its bloodstream.

To invest in art — whether by collecting it, studying it, or creating it — is to invest in the part of yourself that cannot be taxed, inflated away, or stolen.

An investment in creating art or literature, fiction or non-fiction, can give rise to a stream of royalties which outlives you in a way other pensions tend not to.

Purchasing, sponsoring or co-creating art gives the value of having something worthwhile and durable which is a utility in itself.

5. Education — Yours and Your Children’s

Knowledge compounds faster than money. Education expands your earning power, your worldview, and your resilience. It is the only investment that cannot be taken from you.

And when you invest in your children’s education, you are planting trees whose shade you may never sit under — but they will.

Investing in your own education enables you to do well at all the other forms of investment and to keep them in balance.

The GoldList Method is one of my gifts to humanity to assist people to get the most out of their time and money investments in learning. You can find out about it on http://www.huliganov.tv . You’re welcome.

4. Planning and Managing Your Private Pensions

Private pensions are the quiet giants of long‑term security. Tax‑efficient, compounding, and often neglected until it is too late. A well‑managed pension is a time machine: it moves today’s discipline into tomorrow’s comfort.

It is the investment that rewards you for thinking in decades rather than months.

It is usually one of the better deals a person can make in their lives as Companies pay part, and there are tax incentives. However, quite a lot of the money ends up in the pockets of people working in these Companies, and also beware of consultants who try to assist you with pensions. Many of these firms make a living by whittling away at your one, that you need in old age. They are not doing it for the sake of charity, for the sake of clarity.

3. Planning and Managing Your State Pensions

This is where the real leverage hides. Understanding contribution rules, delaying strategically, and maximising entitlements can add hundreds of thousands to your lifetime income.

A single decision — such as delaying your ZUS pension to the optimal age — can be worth more than a decade of saving. And for your spouse, the widow’s pension can be the difference between fragility and security.

State pensions are the investment that teaches you the power of knowing the rules of the system you live in.

And the time to be asking those questions is not when you are on the cusp of retirement.

Usually when it comes to delaying pension rights there is a curve on a graph as to the expected benefit and you need to be able to map ythat curve and how it shows the optimal strategy for you, bearing in mind how much you need to stop working, health-wise, your own expected longevity, whether or not you are likely to leave a widow and what the rules are for widow’s pensions in your jurisdiction. It gets complicated but being able to graph it for yourself is something that can make a huge difference to your whole twilight years experience.

2. Your Doctors’ Visits, Check‑Ups, and Blood Work

The best financial plan collapses if you die before you can claim it. Regular monitoring is not a medical expense — it is a risk‑management tool. It buys you time, warning, and the ability to act.

A blood test that costs 500 PLN can protect a pension worth hundreds of thousands. A check‑up that catches a problem early can give you the one thing money cannot buy: the chance to be part of the process.

This is the investment that protects all the others.

People in the past tended to die of war, of violence and of plagues. MOst of the people reading this are likely to die of either something which gives them no warning, especially heart attacks and strokes, or traffic accidents or violence, or, if they are lucky, something like cancer or dementia which gives you time to act. This is especially important if you are delaying pension rights in order to maximise the overall lifetime value of the pension. In some jurisdictions a widow’s pension for example is only based on a precentage of the pension of a husband already claiming it when he dies. If he hasn’t started climing it, in these jurisdictions the swidow gets nothing. So people in this situation must above all take care to cover their risk of circulatory diseases, as well as keeping themselves out of dangerous situations as far as they can. You get one death, and it ends up much of a muchness whether it’s a heart attack one night or cancer over several months, but from the point of view of financial planning, the death with a warning is preferable, if you get any say in it.

1. Fasting

The highest return on capital employed in human history. It costs nothing. It reduces inflammation, metabolic risk, cardiovascular risk, and the probability of sudden death — the only catastrophic risk in any retirement plan as outlined above.

Fasting is the cheapest, most powerful longevity hedge available to you. It is the investment that teaches you that discipline is a form of freedom.

Working on physical strength is another, working on physical strength using the principles of the Starting Strength Method by Mark Rippetoe is a tremedous investment in health also.

0. Accepting the Gospel

The investment that transcends all others. Everything above concerns the decades you have left. This one concerns eternity.

It is the only investment whose return is not measured in money, time, or health — but in meaning, hope, and the assurance that death is not the end of the story.

It is the investment that teaches you that the greatest wealth is not accumulated but received.

The Bible shows a way of being granted Eterenal Life and forgiveness of sins, Huge eternal rewards with no price, because Someone Else has borne that price, He did it on a wooden cross outside Jerusalem in the middle of the history of mankind, at the geographical crossroads of civilisations.

We know His name. It is Jesus. Jesus is the most important investment you can ever make, to the point where it makes perfect sense to invest your entire soul in Him.

The End of an Era: Why Management Charges Became a Global Target — and How Poland’s CIT Reform Fits Into a Worldwide Shift






Poland’s proposed changes to the CIT Act — which would exclude from tax‑deductible costs a wide range of intangible services provided by shareholders, directors, and other related individuals — may feel sudden. In reality, they are part of a much longer global trend. For more than a decade, tax authorities worldwide have been tightening the rules around related‑party management services, advisory fees, and other intangible charges.

To understand where Poland is heading, it helps to understand how we got here — and why management charges became such a persistent target for regulators.

1. The historical problem: intangible services are hard to verify

Management services have always been difficult for tax authorities to audit. Unlike physical goods or operational services, intangible activities such as:

  • strategic advice,
  • oversight,
  • management support,
  • business development,
  • or “services of a similar nature”

leave no physical trace. Documentation is often subjective, and the economic value is hard to benchmark.

This created a structural vulnerability: the same invoice could represent genuine value — or pure profit extraction. Tax authorities could not reliably tell the difference.

2. The BEPS era: intangible services under global scrutiny

The OECD’s Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) initiative (2013–2015) identified related‑party intangible services as one of the easiest ways to shift profits across borders. BEPS introduced concepts such as:

  • the benefit test,
  • arm’s‑length pricing,
  • substance over form,
  • and the prohibition of shareholder activities being charged to subsidiaries.

Countries began tightening their rules — but each in its own way.

3. How other countries responded

Poland is not alone. Similar developments have unfolded across major jurisdictions:

United Kingdom — IR35 and disguised employment

The UK targeted individuals invoicing through personal service companies while effectively acting as employees. The logic is similar to Poland’s: if you behave like an employee or director, you should be taxed like one.

Germany — strict transfer pricing and “shareholder activity” doctrine

German tax authorities routinely reclassify management fees as non‑deductible profit distributions if they overlap with governance duties or lack clear economic benefit.

Netherlands — substance requirements

Management fees remain deductible only when the service provider has real substance and the service is clearly documented and benchmarked.

Australia and Canada — aggressive audits and “reasonableness” tests

Both countries frequently deny deductions for related‑party management fees unless the taxpayer can prove necessity, benefit, and market value.

Across jurisdictions, the pattern is consistent: intangibles + related parties = high‑risk area.

4. Poland’s proposal: a decisive, domestic‑focused approach

The Polish draft goes further than many international counterparts by:

  • targeting domestic related individuals,
  • disallowing entire categories of intangible services,
  • applying a 5% ownership threshold,
  • and offering only narrow exceptions (employment, board remuneration, resale, production necessity).

This is not a refinement — it is a structural redesign of how shareholder‑managers may interact with their companies.

The Ministry of Finance’s message is clear:

If you want to be paid for managing your own company, do it through employment or board remuneration — not through service invoices.

This is both a tax policy and a governance intervention.

5. Why management charges became a target

The global crackdown is driven by several long‑standing issues:

• Valuation ambiguity

There are no reliable market comparables for “strategic advice” or “management support”.

• Overlap with governance duties

Directors charging for what they should already be doing creates inherent conflict.

• Profit‑shifting potential

Management fees can reduce taxable profit in the company while shifting income to individuals taxed at lower rates.

• Administrative burden

Auditing intangible services consumes enormous resources, often leading to years of litigation.

• Lack of economic substance

In many cases, the service provider is the same person who owns or manages the company.

Given these challenges, many jurisdictions concluded that the enforcement cost outweighs the benefit. Poland is now taking the same view — but applying it broadly and domestically.

6. Governance implications for Polish companies

For many organisations — especially SMEs, family businesses, and founder‑led firms — the change is not just a tax issue. It affects:

  • remuneration structures,
  • shareholder agreements,
  • board roles,
  • and the division between ownership and management.

The reform pushes companies toward:

  • employment contracts,
  • formal board remuneration,
  • managerial contracts taxed on the progressive scale.

This will require a shift from flexible, informal arrangements to transparent, documented governance structures.

7. The bottom line

Poland’s CIT proposal is part of a global movement — but executed with unusual decisiveness. Management charges became a target because they combine:

  • tax risk,
  • valuation uncertainty,
  • governance ambiguity,
  • and administrative complexity.

For companies, this means the era of flexible shareholder‑provided services is ending. The future belongs to:

  • clear governance roles,
  • formal remuneration structures,
  • and robust documentation of economic substance.

My colleagues at Grupa Strategia will continue to monitor the legislative process and support clients in adapting their governance and remuneration models to the new regulatory landscape. Should you wish to receive professional advice and tax planning for your international Group with branches in Poland to see how your current or expected practice will be affected by the coming changes in Poland, please email david.james@grupastrategia.com

Open Letter to the Prime Minister on the revision of the concept of valuations for CPOs


Dear Prime Minister Starmer,

I hope this letter finds you well. I am writing to express my concerns regarding the recent changes to compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) and the concept of “hope value” in land valuation.

While I understand the government’s intention to manage public project costs effectively, I believe that excluding hope value from CPO compensation creates inconsistencies in land valuation practices. If hope value is excluded for CPOs, it should also be excluded from the valuation of land for business rates and council taxes. This would ensure a fair and transparent system, where landowners are not disadvantaged by contradictory valuation methods. If a business’s rateable value of land is low, then owners cannot complain if that becomes the basis for compensation on a CPO, and by the same token, the state should not be giving back a lower value than the one they themselves set for the purposes of council taxes. Government should be consistent, and I am not sure that provision for this has been included in the legislation.

Furthermore, I propose that a moral payment be considered to cover the costs of rearranging investments around the affected property. This would acknowledge the broader impact on landowners beyond the immediate land value.

The term “hope value” is a neologism and not one found in any accounting standards, national or international. Moreover, it seems designed to be used exclusively by the government in their own favor against private investors. If private investors were to insist that the aspirational aspect of value be removed from market values, no deal would ever be made. As such, this is a fresh case of state exceptionalism in an area where state exceptionalism is not warranted.

Consistency in valuation practices across different governmental processes is crucial to ensure fairness and maintain public trust. I urge you to consider these points and advocate for a more balanced approach to land valuation and compensation.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

David of Quoracy