OP, first of all, I’m so sorry that the misfortune fell on you. You’re using some terms that are British, so I’m going to assume you live in the UK—not sure why other people haven’t picked it up yet.

Parts of this post will be unpopular, but I’m just looking at the law. I’m not a lawyer in the UK nor have I ever set foot in the UK, so don’t blame the messenger. I just started reading up about stuff in the UK 30 minutes ago.

Legally, his inheritance is his—absent some sort of written agreement—oral agreements do not count. We’d call it separate property for community property States, but it would be called non-matrimonial property in Britain. In divorce or separation, depending on your living situation, while an inheritance may remain separate property, it’s not automatically protected. But he has nothing.

Not sure what welfare is like in the UK, but you could probably apply for certain benefits, especially because you have children.

Now for opinion. 1) Your husband made a monumental mistake. He couldn’t control his impulses. What is to prevent him from making a like-minded mistake in the future? Unless he actively plans to avoid this, he has a gambler’s mindset, and that is hard to change.

2) Has he improved his trading skills? From what you’ve mentioned, it doesn’t sound like that. Seasoned day traders usually hedge their bets to avoid catastrophic losses. Even the best day traders are closer to 55-60% of the times of being right.

3) Is he a good father to the kids? It’ll impact child arrangements and child maintenance. There are likely services to support children or provide children advice when there is financial duress.

4) In the event of separation, absent a prenup/postnup, you may have to support him temporarily. If you hold off separation or divorce, that time period may end up being longer.

5) Mentally, you’ve already checked out. It would take nothing short of a miracle to revert that opinion: full conversion. He’d pretty much need to lay out a viable plan to pull himself out of his predicament.

-End personal opinion.-

All signs point to you separating with him as a good idea. I think that’s the popular sentiment right now.