< Previous50 Vol. 24/06, 15 May - 31 May 2023 HOW TO GET YOUR FINANCES BACK IN SHAPE Damian Hitchen, CEO of Saxo Bank MENA, believes nancial tness is essential for everyone, regardless of age or gender Revisit your asset allocation Debt management Save for your retirement Map out a budget Take time to identify and record your goals The rise and fall of the nancial markets can often be overwhelming. Start with determining your nancial goals. This will help you plan the next steps and diversify your investments. The digitisation of investment has allowed rst-time and seasoned investors to explore a wide variety of assets they can deploy savings into such as equities, bonds, commodities, exchange-traded funds, and mutual funds. By using a multi-asset approach, investors can diversify their investments against concentration risk and take more participation in the markets. Credit card debts often lead to spiralling expenses and even more so with interest rates on the increase. If you use credit cards to make payments, keep a strict check on how much you owe on your cards and try to set yourself an upper limit that you can be disciplined with. Global consultancy Mercer states that nearly 45 percent of employees in the UAE have no plans to ensure an adequate standard of living after retirement. Additionally, research shows that by not actively investing in the stock markets for your retirement can result in a negative loss of 12 percent compared to those who do participate in global markets. Also investing as early as you, which means for as long as you can reap the rewards of long-term compound returns, in spite of short-term market volatility. The ideal allocation of budgets is based on a 50/30/20 rule – with 50 percent spent on necessities, 30 percent on needs, and the remaining 20 percent on savings/debt payments. However, it is important to be exible and work on a monthly budget spend rather than yearly. THURSDAY 5TH OCTOBER 2023 GROSVENOR HOUSE, DUBAI, UAE Introducing the Education Excellence Awards - honouring the teachers, leadership teams and support staff, providing world class education in Dubai. The awards are now open to nominate for all schools providing Foundation to Year 12 education in all curriculums in Dubai. Scan to visit website For more information, visit EdExcellenceAwards.com or email edexcellenceawards@itp.comNext >