ETF, SCPI, gold, stocks… how to offer these investments at Christmas?

Certain investments can become both original and lasting gifts for your loved ones. Find out what you can give them for Christmas 2024 and how much they can bring them!

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What if, this year, you slipped some investments under the tree? Certainly, attention is a priori less dreamy than a connected watch, a luxury perfume, or Pokémon cards and other star toys which should garnish Santa’s sack. However, the idea also has something to appeal: in addition to its originality, it is also a way of introducing loved ones to saving and building wealth. As a bonus, unlike a gift of money, certain investments have the ability to generate income over time, making them a much more sustainable gift.

To help you with your shopping, here are three original gift ideas that can be aimed at beginners in investing, as well as more experienced savers looking to diversify their portfolios. They are ranked from the most secure solution to the most risky.

Gold: a safe and sustainable asset par excellence

As a gift, gold has a double benefit. First, on a symbolic level, offering a piece of jewelry, a watch, or a piece made of the most precious metal is always a way of showing one’s attachment. And this gift also has virtues as an investment, particularly if you offer so-called “investment” gold (coins and bars). Indeed, gold being a “safe haven” asset, its value is supposed to increase in the long term. In fact, the value of an ounce of gold (a little over 28 grams) has continued to rise for more than half a century, going from 35 euros in 1968 to 2,500 euros today. It must be said that the year 2024 was particularly favorable for this asset, since gold should be among the best investments of the year, with a 30% increase in its price since January 1. And its price which could rise further in 2025.

Gift idea: to please without breaking the bank, it is possible to buy 1 gram bars for around a hundred euros currently directly in a physical store (Comptoir national de l’or, Gold in cash) or online ( Gold avenue).

SCPI: offering regular income to a loved one

Giving the keys to an apartment or a house can be a somewhat excessive gift. Fortunately, it is also possible to offer real estate in other ways, in particular thanks to real estate investment companies, SCPIs. The latter acquire and manage on behalf of their partners a real estate portfolio, the vast majority of which is professional (offices, shops, logistics centers, etc.). By purchasing a share in SCPI, and giving it as a gift, you are offering a small part of a vast real estate portfolio without the constraints of rental management. A present which has the advantage of paying regular income: at a fixed deadline (month, quarter or half-year), the SCPI in fact pays its partners part of the rent collected according to the number of shares held.

As a bonus, the sale of SCPI shares benefits from the tax reductions in force for donations. Each parent can thus give up to 100,000 euros of SCPI shares to each of their children every 15 years.

Gift idea: you can refer to the ranking of the best SCPIs of 2024, which should show up to 11% return this year. Among them, we find shares which can be acquired from 200 euros.

Offering stocks and ETFs: for budding or already experienced investors

Finally, you can also offer your loved ones access to the financial markets, or an introduction to the stock market. While this may frighten some people, we must keep in mind that it is stocks that remain the best performing investment in the long term, with the added bonus of regular payments of income, in the form of dividends. To avoid the volatility (upward or downward variation) that the price of a stock may experience, it is also possible to bet on ETFs, financial instruments which follow the price of a basket of several diversified stocks or of an index (CAC 40 in France, S&P 500 in the United States, etc.).

Gift idea: this innovation has just been made possible for the Trade Republic savings application, with the possibility of choosing from 10,000 stocks and ETFs, and investing the amount of your choice (from 1 euro) , then send the gift (by email or printed card) to a loved one, whether they are already a user of the application or not.