Over exposure to the US is difficult because theyāre so much bigger than any other economy. Vanguard offer VWRL & VWRP these are global and often considered a good bench mark for a passive diverse portfolio.
The main difference is VWRL pays dividends while VWRP reinvests the dividends.
Using these youāll have exposure to the US, UK & Europe / Japan without having to worry about having too much focus on one place.
Is there like a rule to knowing where these originate from based in the abbreviation or do you just manually search them all up? such as āFTSEā means nothing to me, does it actually correlate to somthing?
Every stock gets its owns code or ticker. Itās a series of unique letter that helps void confusion and become short hand when you get used to them. Each exchange has their own rules but theyāre between 3 & 5 characters with a preceding currency symbol.
There are tonnes of acronyms and honestly youāll pick the ones that apply up as you learn more. FTSE for example stands for āFinancial Times Stock Exchangeā even though this is as historic naming and not relevant anymore.
The full name of Ā£VWRL is Vanguard FTSE All-World UCITS Distributing ETF (GBP) - you can see why short hand becomes common! An ETF will often have a code that doesnāt always make as much sense because of their complex names.
Private companies are often more logical $FB = Facebook & $APPL = Apple. The free trade app does a great job at letting you search by name so you donāt have struggle to start with.
Another, possibly obvious, question.
So, Iāve got some stocks now, and theyāre looking promising, portfolio is up overall, which is nice. I understand I can sell the shares for more than I paid for them, which is, I assume, the whole point.
But, dividendsā¦ How do they happen? And how would I know which shares pay a dividend of some sort?
Not the ETF I have which is called UK Dividend, that one is fairly obvious (I assume?)
Look on the stock tab you chose and scroll down and you will see a stats section with a bit called āDividend yieldā 
A good source to look into dates etc for dividends is
DividendMax - notifications, declarations, forecasts and tools for UK private investors
Freetrade have your back @SB426
Basically think of a dividend as a thank you from the company to its owners. Some stocks are historically good dividend payers, some arenāt and other donāt pay them at all.
Good dividend payers include - Banks, House Builders, Insurance companies & Oil.
Okay - most of the market
Zilch - Growth companies like AirBnb & Uber. Also Amazon famously donāt pay a dividend, never have and unlikely ever will.
High dividends likely mean that the company wonāt grow (much), so the share price wilp likely not rise (much) at all. So, even if a company pays you 5% per year in dividends, investing in a company that doesnāt pay one might be more lucrative.
I kinda figured they would, they seem to be really good at that.
Oooh, scroll downā¦ OK, found it (didnāt know that was there) Itās blank on those where itās even there? Because no dividends yet, because Iāve been here like 5 minutes? And assuming if thereās no section then no dividend?
Iām going for a veritable pick and mix! So Iāll end up with some paying dividends, some not, some ETF, some separate companies. If I mix it up enough it might work out!
If it is blank then no dividends on that stock. It would be great to say N/A if they never pay or something like none last year as some do at times. This is why that site is a good tool to look at historically.
Just remember if FT say dividend of 12% that doesnāt mean it will be next year and as @SebReitz said above it is often better to buy other shares. Personally I mix dividend and non dividend and like investing pay outs on dips in other stocks. Edit - just seen your last message 
Thatās exactly what I do
And now I feel stupidā¦ it was all blank because I had Wi-Fi turned off. Wi-Fi back on and all is well.
Quick question from me. Ginkgo Bioworks recently went public with a valuation in the $15bn region. Yet as far as I can see its market cap is only in the $2.5bn region. Whatās behind the difference between these two numbers?
It looks to me like the Market cap in the app hasnāt caught up with the SPAC merger. It looks like Google have them at $20bn & yahoo donāt know. Iām assuming the data providers will sort this shortly.
Thanks Neil. Thatās useful to know. Thought I was completely missing something so good to know it is more the data!
So, the stocks ISAā¦Iām sure I saw a pop up saying a free share if I open one, but now canāt find any reference to the offer?
Iām sure I also saw something recently. A larger value free share than usual if you transferred in (starting at Ā£50?). Also canāt find anything now, which is awkward as I have started the transfer!
I might drop them a line and see if I am eligible.
In fact - found it. There is a pop up on my mobile when looking at the main site. Clicking it goes to the āplusā page with no further details, so who knows.
I have emailed them to see what the eligibility is and whether I can get oneā¦
I found it - If you tap the little person icon in the top right corner of the app, then Contact Us, the message from Charlotte is there.
Itās a sliding scale, where if you open a new FT Stocks ISA and deposit Ā£500 you get a free Ā£50 share, if you deposit more the value of the share goes up.
Soā¦
Ā£500 - Ā£5000 = Ā£50 share
Ā£5001 - Ā£10000 = Ā£100 share
Ā£100001 - Ā£15000 = Ā£150 share
And so onā¦
The ISA has to be a new one, not sure if existing customers can open a new one and get the offer or if itās only first time FT ISAs.
Your deposit of at least Ā£500 must be made within 14 days of opening the ISA, and any ISA transfer must be started within 14 days, and completed before 31 Jan 2022.
Free shares will be awarded within 30 days of your cleared deposit, or completed transfer.
All of this has to be started before 30.11.21.
Hopefully I am eligible. I started the transfer about a week ago and Iām hoping it will all be cleared soon 
I understand no one can predict the market however would investing now be good or should i hold off? everywhere i read people say the markets going to crash, even my grandad whoās been investing his whole life told me i should probably wait, but iām looking at various things such as Tesla, Oils, index funds etc. and really want to start investing.
what would you guys do, invest now or wait? if i wait how long would that be?
