Welcome to Fluther.
Congratulations, first of all. It’s not easy saving that much money.
There’s no ‘right’ answer to your question. If you want high returns, then you have to accept a certain amount of risk. If you want your capital to be rock-solid secure, then you’re not going to be rewarded with much of a return. So what is ‘best’ is going to depend on several factors:
1. What you know—the industries you feel comfortable investing in, should you decide to buy stocks or invest directly in a business;
2. What you can or want to learn—in terms of investing in your own ability to learn things you don’t already know about industries, businesses and investment vehicles themselves;
3. The amount of risk you’re willing to take on—as your knowledge and confidence grow, then so should your ability to control for various risks and accept more risk knowledgeably and willingly;
4. Your age and earning ability—obviously if you’re at retirement age or disabled, then you won’t be working much, if at all, and won’t have a fallback source of income, but if you’re young and already employed, then you should definitely consider higher-risk investments, because you have the luxury of time to turn iffy or bad investment decisions around, and a chance for ‘seedling’ investments to grow strong.
I always recommend learning about the stock market and investing that way. Start small—baby steps—and gain confidence from good decisions, and learn from the bad ones… and be ruthless about cutting off losing investments. If you make a stock purchase expecting it to go one way and it goes, say, 7–10% against your thoughts, then sell it without a second thought and learn from the mistake.
Ride your winners as long as they keep on winning.