Amassing a multi-million pound investment portfolio is a great achievement.
Managing to build it up within Isas – where no further tax will fall due on capital gains or income – is an achievement of an altogether different magnitude.
The strict limits on Isa contributions (and contributions to Isas’ predecessor, the Pep) means that reaching Isa millionaire status typically requires a combination of dedicated saving and exceptional investment returns.
Amassing a multi-million pound investment portfolio is a great achievement.
Managing to build it up within Isas – where no further tax will fall due on capital gains or income – is an achievement of an altogether different magnitude.
The strict limits on Isa contributions (and contributions to Isas’ predecessor, the Pep) means that reaching Isa millionaire status typically requires a combination of dedicated saving and exceptional investment returns.
They stopped adding new money to their respective accounts after 2000. Those initial investments, while substantial, have grown with astonishing success to become a multi-million pound portfolio today, capable of providing an annual six-figure income on which zero tax is payable.
Mr Bagria oversees the portfolio with help from his wife, using standard do-it-yourself Isa accounts from Barclays stockbrokers. Such success has not come without risk.
Mr Bagria runs a highly “concentrated” portfolio that contains only 10 to 15 stocks at any one time.
Far from poring over reams of data late into the night, he commits around six hours a week to research.
The returns have been staggering. If you had given Mr Bagria £1,000 in 1993, he would have grown it to £287,000 by the end of 2016.
Few professional investors can boast any such record. Indeed, his annualised returns of 26pc exceed the performance of billionaire Warren Buffett, founder of Berkshire Hathaway.
Had Mr Bagria done as most Isa investors do and chosen a well regarded unit trust offered by a major fund group, his returns would have been pedestrian by comparison.
The best-performing fund over the period 1993‑2016 – Schroder US Smaller Companies – would have turned the same £1,000 into £25,000.
A commendable result, but nothing next to Mr Bagria’s achievement. The best-performing mainstream UK-invested fund, Fidelity Special Situations, would have grown £1,000 to £21,550.
Telegraph Money spoke to Mr Bagria to find out how he did it.
“My first degree was in biochemistry and my masters was in computer science. When Peps were launched I had been thinking about long-term savings, and I thought they were a great idea,” he said.
“Initially I gave my money to a bank to manage. That got me interested – but the stocks they picked didn’t go anywhere.”
