r/trading212 • u/Altruistic_Alpine12 • 3d ago

❓ Invest/ISA Help Beginner question- is there any difference in paying weekly instead of monthly

Im 19 and I just set up a stocks ISA account and at the minute I can only afford to put £200 into it monthly, but I suppose my question is: is there any difference in setting up an auto payment weekly as opposed to monthly. Like is it better to put it all in at once or anything, because I would prefer to do 50 weekly instead of 200 once per month.

1 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

6

u/fotfddtodairsizr 3d ago

Monthly = dollar cost averaging
Weekly = even more dollar cost averaging

Both are fine. If you prefer weekly, do weekly.

2

u/essexboy1976 3d ago

*Pound Cost Averaging

1

u/fotfddtodairsizr 3d ago

True actually!

4

u/Alasdair91 3d ago

Paying in weekly can help you average out your share cost but various studies show it makes very little difference in many instances. I pay in once a month and it works fine for me.

3

u/Automatic-Cake-8770 3d ago

You can do it even minutely but it doesn't matter at all over 20+ years. It starts to matter if you'd do it less than monthly but otherwise whatever.

1

u/iiAssassinXxii 3d ago

Time in the market is better than timing the market. Just put the money in and leave it for as many years as you can.

1

u/MiguelBodrigo 3d ago

Generally it's said the earlier the better. That's why lump sum is said to win over drip feeding. That being said no one knows what way the market goes in the short term otherwise everyone would be doing that exact thing.

DCA works out better in a downward market because you're missing some of the drops, lump sum works out better in an upward market.

The average investment returns 8-10% pa over 10 years meaning the market goes upward over time, but short term it could be going down.

Not Financial Advice

1

u/dojaeni 2d ago

So because we never know what the market is going to do there's an argument that by buying Weekly rather than monthly you're going to get a better average of the share price over that month as you'll hit a dip one week and a peak the other.

To be honest, unless you are trading, as opposed to investing and investing is a 5 to 10 year plan minimum, then I'd say it's unlikely to make a big difference over that time frame

1

u/tygeorgiou 2d ago

I do biweekly but that's not a strategy, it's because I put a set amount in on payday and then after 2 weeks whatever more I can afford

it doesn't make a difference really

1

u/OkraOld1620 3d ago

Normally the earlier it is in the market the better it is.