SHARE OWNERSHIP UP

THE latest share ownership study released by the ASX shows around 7.3 million people, or 43 per cent of the adult Australian population, own shares directly or indirectly.

The study found that individual investors holding shares directly has increased to 30 per cent of the adult population, up 25 per cent compared with the last study in 2008.

In other results, eight out of 10 investors who own shares felt it was a good time to buy or to hold shares. A total of 26 per cent of all private investors say they will buy shares in the next 12 months.

Research, analysis and insights manager Sandra Boyd-Hoare, says the study reflected a return to confidence among the investment market.

“Optimism is definitely returning, there’s been an increasing preparedness among the population to invest in listed shares on the ASX,” she says.

“Similarly, there’s also been a decrease in the amount of people investing in unlisted shares, fund managers or trusts. This shows people are confident in the transparency of investing in ASX-listed companies, where they can take control of their own investments.”

The study was conducted nationally with a randomly selected sample of 2400 adult Australians. It highlights the incidence of share ownership among the population and offers insights into the attitudes, knowledge and behaviour of retail share market investors in Australia.

The study also found 18 per cent of the population who have not been active in the sharemarket will enter at some stage. The majority of these are aged under 45 and want to increase their knowledge first.

Internationally, the finding that 43 per cent of adult Australians own shares continues to rank Australia among the leading share-owning nations in the world on a per capita basis. Only 12 per cent of investors owning shares directly prefer to delegate their investment management.

Boyd-Hoare says experiences during the global financial crisis been a key influence on the trend for more active personal involvement in investments.