The 2017 ASX Australian Investor Study was recently released with the following top 10 findings:
1 - 60% of Australian adults or 11.2 million people hold investments outside of their institutional superannuation fund.
2 - 37% of Australian adults or 6.9 million people hold investments that are available through a financial exchange.
3 - On-exchange investments are a more common investment choice than cash or property.
4 - More and more young people are investing outside their institutional superannuation funds; over the last 5 years the proportion of 18-24 year olds investing has double from 10% to 20%.
5 - Self managed superannuation funds use will continue to grow, with 30% of Australian adults that do not currently use an SMSF planning to set one up in the future.
6 - 84% of lapsed investors intend to return to investing with 41% intending to return in the next 2 years.
7 - 60% of all investors use some form of professional advice (financial planner, accountant, stockbroker, etc) to help them make investment decisions.
8 - Young investors are more risk averse than older investors. 81% of investors under 35 are seeking stable investment returns, while 41% of investors over 55 are comfortable with some variability in their returns and 21% of the most risk averse investors expect returns over 10%.
9 - Diversification is not well understood. 46% of investors claim to be diversified and hold 2.7 investment products, while 40% of investors say they do not have diversified portfolios, 15% of investors don't know if they're diversified and 75% of share owners hold only Australian shares.
10 - 40% of investors holding on-exchange investments transacted in the last 12 months.
You can download the full report here - http://www.asx.com.au/education/2017-asx-investor-study.htm. Information produced by Deloitte Access Economics