Nowadays, everybody is looking for the opportunity to invest with different varieties of investment apps. And most importantly, investing doesn’t only save your money but brings your financial life back on track. With an investment app, you will have full control over your finances by keeping track of your spendings and returns.

That’s not all because you have different investment opportunities to invest your money in. For example, the GKFX platform provides investment opportunities through the trading of currencies. You can read the Vantage broker here for more information about their services!

The below investment apps are thoroughly evaluated based on their security and features. These apps might not be from popular investment brands, but they have made remarkable breakthroughs in providing unique investment opportunities to users. Whether you’re a professional or a beginner looking for an investment app, you can get started from the below lists that includes:

1. Invstr

Invstr is among the best investment apps for beginners with a series of education tools. Invstr brought real-life investing into its app with immense features that would benefit users. The app is specifically designed to enlighten investors and beginners about stocks. Unlike other investment apps, Invstr has engaging stock games that give users the opportunity to make money.

2. Wealthbase

Wealthbase is a new investment app with different varieties of stock games. It gives users the ability to have fun, while they make money. In this investment app, you can play engaging games with friends. And most importantly Wealthbase has a social media area where friends post information about stocks. Wealthbase can be accessed through web and mobile apps. You can also check Pepperstone Minimum Deposit for Minimum deposit requirements.

3. Wealthfront

Wealthfront is the best investment app for portfolio management. Wealthfront has different varieties of Robo-advisors that manage the account of investors at a flat fee. The Robo-advisors can manage different varieties of accounts such as taxable and IRA accounts. The fee they charge investors ranges from 0.25% to 0.95% annually. However, the minimum account balance is $500.

4. Acorns

Acorns bring users to the investment world with seamless features to broaden their experience. With Acorn you have the opportunity to start investing from a small amount. You can also link your credit and debit card to start investing. Their fee is charged monthly ranging from $1 to $5. They allow you to create different varieties of investment accounts. Apart from Acorns, you can also check forex brokers list, if you are looking for an investment or trading platform.

5. Betterment

Betterment is similar to Wealthfront where investor’s accounts are managed by a Robo-advisor. Betterment provides a professional set of managed portfolios using ETFs. They have the best socially investing services. Their management fee is 0.25% annually or a fixed fee of 25$ for any investment above $10,000 yearly. There’s no minimum balance for opening an account on Betterment.

6. Robinhood

Robinhood is an investment app that offers smooth trading services to investors. Its application interface is very engaging and detailed for a smooth trading experience. With the Robinhood apps, investors can trade stocks, ETFs, options, and cryptocurrency for free without any hidden charges. Their minimum account balance required for opening an account remains $0.

7. Webull

Webull is very popular among other investment apps because of its low-cost trading. With Webull, investors can easily trade stocks, ETFs, options, and cryptocurrencies. They charge low exchange fees but offer no commissions for stocks, ETFs, options, and crypto trading. Their minimum account balance remains $0.

8. Stockpile

Stockpile is an engaging app that allows users to buy fractional shares of business around the world. They offer investors the opportunity to buy low shares without charging any monthly fee. They provide different varieties of exceptional features to investors such as allowing investors to send gift cards to friends and families, which can be redeemed as stock.

Conclusion

Nowadays, everybody is looking for the opportunity to invest with different varieties of investment apps. And most importantly, investing doesn’t only save your money but brings your financial life back on track. Take a look at the best investment apps in May 2021 to start making money from investing.

Some companies usually do business using foreign trademarks licensed under franchise arrangements. This allows a locally registered entity to locally use a trademark owned by a foreign company, usually for a fee and subject to certain standards as specified.

Considering the nature of the arrangement, which on the face of it, offers a business advantage to the local entity; there has always been an issue as to whether the local/ Ugandan company is considered imported a service into Uganda?

This issue was the subject of a ruling by the Tax Appeals Tribunal in the case of Apollo Hotel Corporation Ltd v Uganda Revenue Authority TAT Application No. 68 of 2018.

The facts were that in 2008, Apollo Hotel Corporation Ltd (the Applicant) entered into an international license agreement with Sheraton International Inc. a company incorporated in the United States of America. The agreement granted the Applicant the right to operate its hotel in Kampala under the trademarked brand name “Sheraton” and also to use Sheraton International’s centralized reservation system by paying franchise fees to Sheraton International. URA raised a tax assessment of VAT amounting to Ugx. 398,418,285 on the franchise fees. Apollo objected to the assessment and the matter was left for determination by the Tribunal.

The main issue was whether the use of the brand name “Sheraton” and the provision of the centralized reservation system amounted to a supply of an “imported service” for purposes of VAT?

Tax Appeal’s Tribunal in their ruling dated 27th August 2021, dismissed the Application holding that;

i. The use of the trademarked brand name “Sheraton” and the provision of the centralized reservation system amounted to a supply of an imported service.

ii. That VAT was only due on the principal service namely, the right to operate the hotel under the trademark name “Sheraton” using the centralized reservation system.

In reaching its holding, the Tribunal relied on the case of Sagar Ratna Restaurants Pvt Ltd & Ors v The Value Added Tax Officer Where the Delhi High Court in India found that the use of the trademark McDonald’s amounted to a service and not goods for purposes of VAT. The Tribunal thus concluded that the use of the brand name Sheraton under the agreement amounted to service and not goods.

The Tribunal also invoked the destination principle which provides that services supplied from a foreign jurisdiction and consumed in one’s own jurisdiction are considered as imported services. The Tribunal thus reasoned that the Sheraton brand and reservation system was supplied for use in Uganda by Sheraton International Inc. and was used by the Applicant in Uganda. It follows that these services were imported services for the reason that they were supplied from a foreign jurisdiction and consumed in Uganda.

Effect of the decision.

The above decision by the Tribunal sets a precedent that all companies in Uganda which are running businesses using foreign trademarks by paying franchise fees must charge VAT on payments to those foreign persons. The principle in the decision is of wide application and will most likely affect all businesses operating under the franchise arrangements in Uganda.

This decision is a great win for URA in its attempt to tax the digital economy and intangible intellectual property rights. The use of the centralized reservation system which is located in the United States of America is similar to the running of most digital platform-based businesses. This poses a challenge for taxation under the permanent establishment principle which provides for taxation only when an entity has a physical presence in a foreign jurisdiction. The decision provides a window for the taxation of the digital economy.

KEY POINTS

• Within 24 hours, Otedola lost over $480 million due to the oil price crisis. He also lost $280 million due to Naira devaluation and another $160 million when his stocks crashed.
• Before his comeback, Masiyiwa hit rock bottom after losing his fortune in funding a case against the government.
• Abdulsamad Rabiu bounced back after pulling off a near-impossible coalition with competitors to compete for market shares with the prominent market leader.

There is a popular saying that – maintaining success is a more difficult task than attaining it. For someone to attain billionaire status, they have to work harder than everyone else.

Then, to maintain this status, one has to triple the workload, discipline, and dedication that gave them that success in the first place. There are many millionaires and billionaires across the globe who learned the hard way and lost all their fortunes before a twinkle of an eye.

It is normal for businessmen and women to experience turbulence, but when they lose their fortunes – only a few are able to walk their way back to the top. There are many examples of businessmen who lost their fortunes and never made a comeback – not only in Africa but the world at large.

However, this article will be focusing on African businessmen who lost it all and made dramatic comebacks. Their stories give hope and offer a new perspective on the definition of failure.

Check out 3 African billionaires who hit rock bottom but picked themselves up and rebuilt their businesses from the ground up.

Femi Otedola

Femi Otedola is a name we still hear around the billionaire club today because of his doggedness and sheer determination to succeed. In 2008, the Nigerian billionaire experienced a business tornado that was capable of adding him to the list of people who fell from the top.

At that time, Otedola’s company, Forte Oil, was the number one diesel supplier and a big name in the Nigerian market. He had more than 500 retail petroleum stations across the country and had the potential to expand even further.

In 2008, Otedola – who was looking to further tighten his grip as the biggest importer of diesel in Nigeria, controlling over 98% of the market share at that time, ordered one million tons of diesel.

But unfortunately, while his shipment was still at sea, heading for Nigeria, the international oil price dropped from $146 per barrel to $34 per barrel overnight.

To add salt to the injury, the Nigerian economy, which was affected by the fall in oil price, took a decision to devalue the Naira and increase interest rates on loans. Within the space of 24 hours, Otedola lost over $480 million due to the oil price crisis.

He also lost another $280 million as a result of the naira devaluation, and his interest debt rose to a staggering $320 million. As if that was not enough, he lost another $160 million when his stocks crashed in the financial market.

With a debt of over $ 1.2 billion, Otedola was kicked out of the Forbes list of billionaires.

“After I lost the money, something that struck me was that my father had always been my role model in life and the first thing I had to do was to protect his name. He had a policy; honesty was the best policy, so I had to protect that name and his integrity,” Otedola recalled.

So, he remained determined to take the bull by the horn and fight his way back to the top by making strategic decisions. He was able to get his bank to write off $400 million, and he was left with a total of about $800 million to pay.

The next step was to value and sell a huge part of his assets, especially his real estate and shares in several multinationals, and pay off the debt. He sold some of his shares at African Petroleum (AP) and was left with only 34 percent before rebranding it to Forte Oil.

He would go on to further make some key strategic decisions and pay off his debts while slowly but steadily building his business empire back up. In 2014, Otedola shocked the world when Forbes released its list of African billionaires and enlisted Otedola with a net worth of $ 1.8 billion.

Strive Masiyiwa

The name – Strive Masiyiwa is a household name across Africa for many reasons, but his association with Econet Wireless ranks tops the list. Currently, the Zimbabwean billionaire is worth about $3.8 billion, according to Forbes’s latest ranking.

But this did not come overnight; indeed, Mr. Masiyiwa has been up and down – and up the ladder. In the eighties, Strive owned a hugely successful engineering company in Zimbabwe, and as his fortunes grew, he decided to invest in the telecommunication industry in Africa – which was taking shape at that time.

He decided to start his own telecoms company in Africa – Econet Wireless, but the government of Zimbabwe, led by former president Robert Mugabe refused to grant him the license to start the company and operations in Zimbabwe.

But the businessman refused to accept the decision and took the government to court – starting a legal battle that lasted for many years and nearly rendered the African billionaire bankrupt.

He hit rock bottom and lost his fortunes as he continued to fund the case against the government’s decision. After five years of the legal battle, which also ended up affecting his other business operations in the country, the constitutional court ruled in his favour, and Strive Masiyiwa launched Econet Wireless which saw his fortunes rise again.

Today, Strive has an almost permanent spot on the Forbes list of African billionaires and is credited for pioneering the introduction of telecommunication in Africa. He is still in control of over 50 percent of shares in Econet to date.

Abdulsamad Rabiu

Abdulsamad Rabiu is the Chairman of BUA Group. His name appeared on the Forbes list of billionaires for the first time in 2013 after some impressive business decisions that saw his fortunes increase above the one billion dollars mark.

However, the status was short-lived after his name was removed from the list a few years later. The reason for this was that the Nigerian billionaire experienced a huge decline in his worth owing to a devaluation in the Naira in 2017 that affected his finances.

Rather than make negative business decisions to protect what he had left, the Chairman of BUA Group began to make strategic business decisions, including branching into the viable cement market. He raised his cement production capacity by building factories.

Today, with a production capacity of 11 million metric tons, his company, BUA Cement, is the second-largest cement producer in Nigeria. One of his biggest and most successful decisions was merging Kalambaina Cement, a subsidiary company of BUA Cement, with Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN) – a company that traded on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.

As a controlling shareholder, his fortunes rose, and he became the third richest man in Nigeria – taking him back to the Forbes list in 2020.

According to the latest Forbes report, Abdulsamad is now the second richest man in Nigeria, behind Aliko Dangote, with an estimated worth of about $ 6.5 billion.