If I planned to invest £3,000 in a Stocks and Shares ISA, there are several UK shares that I’d consider in 2022.
First on my list is media platform Future (LSE:FUTR). It’s a global platform that owns a lot of specialist title. For instance, it owns dozens of popular magazines, including techradar, tom’s guide, and Moneyweek. In general, I reckon print media is likely to decline over time, but Future has multiple and diversified revenue streams. These days, most of its earnings come from digital adverts and e-commerce products. It can produce content once, then distribute and monetise it in many innovative ways. By using its proprietary technology, it should be able to scale and add new revenue streams.
Quality UK shares
When looking for the best UK shares, I like to see sales, profit and margins all climbing higher. And that’s exactly what I can see with Future. In fact, earnings have grown by 72% a year over the past six years. I reckon that’s pretty impressive.
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It’s also got a great track record and is focusing on attractive, growing markets like the US. Although listed in the UK, Future has a much larger, global audience with 305m online users.
Looking to the future
One of the ways in which it has been growing the business is through buying other smaller content providers and publishers. Many are instantly earnings enhancing, but a word of warning. It can be a challenge integrating other businesses into an organisation, especially if work cultures vary. Also, it faces intense competition, so Future will need to keep innovating to stay ahead. Overall, I’d say it’s an exciting growth stock and I’d definitely consider it for my ISA.
Exciting growth stock
The next UK share I’d consider is another company that demonstrates both quality and growth. It’s Alpha FX (LSE:AFX), which is focused on providing financial solutions. With a market capitalisation of under £1bn, it’s a smaller (but not small) company. But I reckon that’s a good thing. I’ve often found smaller companies to be particularly lucrative, if chosen carefully.
Alpha FX focuses on two areas: foreign exchange risk management and alternative banking. The latter of these is a new addition to the business. Overall, business seems to be going well. Sales and profits have been steadily climbing over many years. It has a diversified client base from a range of sectors, and client numbers are growing.
Driven by its founder
The business is debt-free and benefits from a strong balance sheet. I also like that the firm is founder-led. I generally like to find quality UK shares that ideally offer a double-digit return on capital. With a return on capital figure of over 25%, Alpha FX firmly ticks this box for me.
There are some things to bear in mind, however. As with many industries, it may have seen an increase in staffing costs in recent months. I’m expecting a trading update in January so I’ll be interested to know if that was the case. Also, its alternative banking business is relatively new. Whether its success from the FX risk management business can be replicated is still uncertain.
Overall, I like what I see. I reckon this growing small-cap stock could certainly be worth considering for my portfolio.
