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A guaranteed income for your retirement years, earned through your working life, with no need to worry about getting caught out by the vagaries of the stock market. Sounds good, doesn't it? That's what a public sector pension delivers - and it's a far better deal than the retirement funds most people in the private sector save into. So, why do we want to make the good thing worse, rather than the bad thing better? Shouldn't we be doing things the other way round? And shouldn't the government be doing everything it can to improve private sector pensions rather than chip away at their already inferior benefits? Georgie Frost, Helen Crane and Simon Lambert talk pensions - and the gulf between the public and private sector that is getting ever wider. Just how good is a public sector pension? Do many of those in line for them even realise how good they are? And how can we make the private sector catch up rather than trigger a race to the bottom? Plus, why the Budget was very bad news if you earn £52,000, can Argos be saved - and is reviving the caralogue the answer, why are food prices so high, and finally, have you got one of the names most likely to win the Premium Bonds?

The dust has settled on the Budget but while we now know what Rachel Reeves plans for our finances, many questions remain. The Budget featured a raft of tax rises — but also left out some moves that were widely rumoured to happen. On this special bonus episode, Simon Lambert is joined by Lisa Caplan, of Charles Stanley Direct, to find out what people are asking after the Budget — and the answers to those important questions.

Netflix announced it will buy Warner Bros. Discovery’s studios and streaming assets, beating Paramount Skydance and Comcast who were also bidding for the assets. We discuss the implications for the streaming industry and winners and losers. Plus, Meta cuts spending on the metaverase and stocks on our radar. Travis Hoium, Lou Whiteman, and Jason Moser discuss Netflix buys WBD, Mark Zuckerberg cuts metaverase spending, where will disruption come from next? Plus, stocks on our radar. Companies discussed: Netflix (NFLX), Disney (DIS), Hims & Hers (HIMS), Meta Platforms (META), Alphabet (GOOG), Delta (DAL), Salesforce (CRM). Host - Travis Hoium; Guests - Lou Whiteman, Jason Moser.

We’ve seen some sky high valuations among AI companies lately, and it appears that Anthropic wants to use investor optimism to go public as early as next year. Competition among Anthropic, OpenAI, and many other artificial intelligence companies is heating up and could have profound impacts on investing decisions. Tyler Crowe, Matt Frankel, and Jon Quast discuss Anthropic’s IPO, the competitive landscape of the large language models, Klarna’s Buy Now, Pay Later offering looking more and more like a credit card, and stocks on our radar. Companies discussed: CRWV, FRMI, GOOGL, NVDA, MSFT, META, RIVN, KLAR, SEZL, AMEX, V, MA, KNSL, ALMU, BMI. Host - Tyler Crowe; Guests - Matt Frankel, Jon Quast.

For this episode, James Cameron-Wilson is joined by Chad Kennerk, our occasional American correspondent, to discuss the news that Netflix has made an agreement to acquire Warner Bros. Following the separation of Discovery Global for a total enterprise value of $82.7 billion (equity value $72 billion). James covers Disney’s 64th animated feature, 'Zootropolis 2', an entertaining sprint through a world of zoological delights. He raves about awards contender 'Christy', the extraordinary true story of a female boxer in 1990s’ America starring Sydney Sweeney. James was also pleased with the Disney+ release of 'Swiped', in which a tech entrepreneur played by Lily James has her idea for the dating app Tinder swiped.

A new survey suggests rising costs are changing how people think about money and value. More than two in five say gold is the Christmas gift most likely to hold its value, while four in five say Christmas dinner costs more than last year and nearly two-thirds fear another financial crisis. And, in a lighter twist, Scrooge has beaten the Three Wise Men as the Christmas character most likely to invest in gold. Joining Rory McGowan to discuss this is Precious Metal Experts David Russell.

Love, joy, gratitude — all things to be sought in abundance over Christmas. Adam helps to improve personal relationships in ths episode, looking for opportunities to build goodwill rather than at what could go wrong.

Steve Caplin plays Santa with Simon his little helper as he unveils his 2025 gadgets Christmas gift guide. Many inexpensive stocking fillers come from AliExpress, like Apple Watch chargers, car phone holders, rechargeable fans and micro wire cutters while, from Amazon, you can get contact cleaner and USB extension cables. Steve even explains where to get winter strawberries. More substantial are portable monitors, bike helmets and iPad cases with keyboards. For the well-heeled, what about a Japanese "human washing machine", a box to display your Rolexes, a hypercar or a James Bond DB5 replica?

Russ Mould of A J Bell says that Rachel Reeves' Budget was delivered with an eye on the bond markets. Fortunately for her, the 10-year gilt has been steady since, even if it is higher than when Labour took over and has moved in a different direction to BoE interest rates. All equity investors have an interest in gilt yield, whether they know it or not. Russ reckons this year could be the UK's best performance since 2009. Derided as being dull for being heavy with banks, miners and emerging markets, those have all been good performers, while the once-popular dividend compounders have seen only 1 in the top 20 risers. They got ahead of a sensible value.