The bare essentials

Advisers are likely to have received guidance from life companies recently, advising them against setting up a bare trust where a minor is named as the beneficiary. And they have reason to be confused. The latest guidance comes after life companies launched a raft of these products last year, in responses to changes to the Finance Act. When people were limited in the amount they could transfer to a discretionary trust, because of inheritance tax (IHT) implications, bare trusts were marketed as an alternative. So advisers are justified in wondering why the industry appears to have take...