Too tight to mention

The theme tune of the past decade has been dramatically low interest rates and various things follow from that. People are more inclined to get into debt, company pension schemes have become expensive and there is more government tinkering. The stakeholder pension is an attempt by the government to get low-earners off their backs. Index tracking funds are jolly good things and they became quite popular because of their link with ISAs. Ebanking is certainly very convenient, but loyalty cards haven't been as useful as we thought. Developments such as the 0% credit card are an attempt to buy customers by the banks, although it's not a big come on now that rates are so low. What worries me is that in 20 years' time middle-class England will find themselves retiring with poor pensions and debts around their necks.
Louise Botting, presenter of Moneybox

1. E-banking
We hate our banks but like supermarkets they're hard to avoid. Internet banking offers access to our accounts 24/7. Around 6.6m people have signed up for internet accounts. The march of the internet bank has been marred by breaches of security and technical hitches and most net-bankers still use a website as an add-on to their branch-based account. E-banking will improve as technology is refined and younger people who cut their banking teeth on the internet will wonder how anyone would bother with a telephone, let alone a high-street branch.

2. Loyalty cards
Tesco was the first supermarket into the loyalty-card business in 1995 and it's now hard to imagine a shopping trip without one. Some cards have fallen by the way, but customers protest if attractive schemes are scaled back. The best will endure, but remember the ultimate aim of loyalty schemes is to make you spend.

3. The euro
More than an innovation, this is the embodiment of a genuine financial, economic and political revolution. Twelve countries, one currency, with the notes and coins having been introduced in participating nations at the beginning of this year. The hope, of course, is that it will cement unity between nations and encourage trade. In the UK we must content ourselves with a second-hand experience of the Euro, while our government dithers. Like real baguettes and train services that run on time, the Euro may yet remain a novelty of continental holidays. But it's just a matter of time before we sign up.

4. Flexible accounts
An import from the Antipodes, these loans took off when Branson's Virgin group launched its version in the UK in 1998. The principle is that you can expand or reduce borrowing to suit your life. Unplanned pregnancy? Take a break from payments. Flush with money from a bonus at work? Get shot of some debt. Flexi-loans work best in the hands of people who understand that you can never truly have your cake and eat it; debt eventually has to be repaid but at a time when jobs and partners come and go - traditional 25-year mortgages are no longer up to the job.

5. Stakeholder pensions
Labour's big idea for fixing the pensions problem now that we're living longer than we can afford. Despite the squishy new-Labourish name, stakeholder pensions, launched in April 2000, are a welcome variation on the much-discredited personal pensions of the Tories. Stakeholder pensions are long-term saving schemes that invest in the stock market and are aimed at people earning between ?10,000 and ?20,000 who do not have access to an employer's pension scheme. But they have also proved as popular with wealthy grandparents buying them for grandchildren as with wage earners.

6. 0% credit cards
Credit cards charging no interest sounds too good to be true, surely? Yes, and no. If you read the fine print you can do well out of the deal. Fail to understand them and they are simply Barclaycard in all but name. The idea is that you are charged no interest for a set period, typically six to nine months. If you always pay your cards off, this won't be much use to you. The card companies bank, literally, on the assumption that most people will forget to ditch the card at the end of the special deal when interest charges kick in. If you're a credit junky trying to do cold turkey, these deals can be a good way to pay off your debts. Astute borrowers can do well for themselves by surfing continually to new cards at the end of the beneficial 0% introductory periods.

7. The minimum wage
Introduced in 1999, it is now ?4.10 an hour for adults. It has raised the pay of millions of low-paid workers, especially female part-timers. Despite the protests of employers when it was introduced, British business has learnt to live with it and even the Conservatives have accepted it as less damaging to the profits of employers than they claimed it would be. If there is a failing it is that there are loopholes that companies can exploit to reduce the overall amount they pay to employees; requiring cleaners to buy their own equipment, for example.

8. Index-tracking funds
The stock market figures more prominently in our national consciousness than it did a decade ago. Even some of our favourite coffee haunts sport screens beaming out share information. With the pressure on us to save for retirement, investment is seen as a necessity rather than a gamble. Unless you can afford the risks involved in buying shares, small investors should look to funds that pool their money with other savers. But which fund? Enter the index-tracker constructed to match a particular index, often the FTSE 100. These funds were put on the map by Branson, when he started promoting them in 1995.

9. Internet trading
Online dealers flourished during the stock-market boom two years ago. You can deal less than ?10 through an internet account. Much of their business was fed by fascination with dotcom businesses of which the net dealer businesses were prime examples. Trading has diminished since the bubble burst, but in spare bedrooms throughout the country people are squinting at their computer screens as they rearrange their portfolios.

10. Ethical money management
It is now possible to have every aspect of your financial life organised through an 'ethical' organisation. The field has expanded in the last four years, but can trace its roots to the launch of an ethical fund by Friends Provident in 1984. Investors now have ?5bn invested in funds that aim to eschew unethical investment. Broadly, this means tobacco companies, weapon manufacturers and polluters.

The Future
We'll all need much more money - bigger mortgages, shrinking pensions - but less cash in our pockets as technology allows us to pay by electronic means. Expect gadgets at even the smallest of shops to access our bank accounts directly. The internet will become more popular as a way of buying everything from insurance to investments. We'll be wary of shares, looking to property and other 'physical' assets to make money.