US government bond yields are at 24-year highs and BlackRock has just ended a Treasury underweight it held for most of six years. So why does the bond fund in your cautious portfolio still show a loss over five years? The answer is in how bond funds work — and the statement is not telling you the whole story.

On 1st October France sent its 2027 budget to parliament. If you live in France, this covers what the draft would change for pensions, gifts and furnished lets, and a clause on life assurance policies issued outside France that is worth reading carefully.

Seven months into the conflict with Iran, most people I speak to in the Gulf have decided to stay. The flights are patchy, the advisories are mixed, and the daily bulletins keep coming. This isn’t a piece about leaving. It’s about the handful of financial questions that make staying feel like a decision rather than a gamble.

On 10th September the European Central Bank raised rates. Six days later the US Federal Reserve followed — its first increase in more than three years — and three of the Bank of England’s nine policymakers voted to join them. The cutting cycle everyone had planned around has just gone into reverse. Here’s what that changes.

The safest corner of your portfolio has just had one of its roughest runs in living memory. This month US 30-year yields hit their highest since 2007, and across the developed world — from Japan to the UK — governments are paying more to borrow than they have in decades. Here’s what the bond sell-off means for you.

The queues at Europe’s airports made headlines this summer. The database behind them didn’t. Since April, nearly every non-EU passport crossing an external Schengen border is logged biometrically to the minute — and the days you spend anywhere are now a matter of record. That changes more than your holiday plans.

France lost a net 800 millionaires last year — a rounding error against 2.4 million, except for what it signals. Nobody in this story is fleeing a wealth tax that exists; they’re moving ahead of taxes that might. There’s a planning lesson in that for anyone who lives, owns or earns across borders.

You didn’t sell anything. Markets went nowhere. And the Dutch taxman still wants 36% of a return he assumes you made. With the replacement system stalled in parliament since 7th July and the expat shield expiring in January, here’s how Box 3 really works in 2026 — and what to do before the reference date.

For three years, markets applauded every extra billion the tech giants poured into AI. Last week the applause stopped: Alphabet beat every forecast, raised its spending plans to $205 billion — and suffered its worst day in over a year. This week, the rest of big tech takes the stage.