Over £956 million was invested inside the ISA tax wrapper during October. This was due mainly to the ability of those over 50 by the end of this tax year to invest up to £10,200 into an ISA, from 6th October.

The annual ISA limit of £7,200 remains in force for those investors who have not reached their 50th birthday by 5th April 2010. Those who have reached this age were able to top-up any ISA investments already made this tax year by a further £3,000 in October.

The annual ISA limit is increased to £10,200 for every investor from 6th April 2010. Investors will be able to place up to £5,100 into the cash ISA component and the balance of the annual limit into the stocks and shares ISA component.

In terms of actual investments made, equity funds proved the most popular asset class. This was followed by ‘other’, which was mostly driven by the Absolute Return and Unclassified sectors. In third place was Bond funds. This is the second consecutive month in which Equities have beaten Bonds in terms of investment sales.

Looking at specific IMA sectors, the IMA Property sector was the most popular sector for investors, taking in £367.6 million of net retail sales, the highest since May 2007.

Property funds have witnessed positive net retail sales for seven consecutive months. This is in sharp contract to November and December last year when Property was the lowest selling sector.

Until very recently, Dubai was heralded as an international economic success story. It had experienced a major property boom and billions were being pumped into a variety of developments, all designed to turn Dubai into a trading and service centre for the Gulf region.

The bubble appears to have burst.

Yesterday a move by the State-owned Dubai World to delay paying some of its debt pile had a big impact on global stock markets. In the UK, the FTSE 100 index of leading company shares closed down 170.68 points (or -3.18%). Other world markets displayed similar behaviour.

It is important to note that Dubai World has not defaulted on its $22bn mountain of debt. At least not yet. What triggered panic in the markets yesterday was their intention to defer repayments for six months and the fact that their wealthy (oil rich) emirate neighbour Abu Dhabi did not step up back the debts.

Problems were compounded by the closure of the US stockmarket for Thanksgiving Day and a technical glitch at the London Stock Exchange (LSE), preventing automated trading for several hours.

The big question now is just how much exposure the British banks have to this increasingly bad looking debt. UK banking shares had a difficult day yesterday, with RBS, Lloyds and HSBC all holding syndicated loans for Dubai World.

Today could be ‘interesting’ for global investment markets. The Dow Jones is back open, but with an abbreviated session for stock trading. It is ‘Black Friday’ today in the US, traditionally the start of frantic Christmas season shopping. There is every chance that today could be renamed ‘Red Friday’ when markets open later.