Investment
Confidence in stocks has grown significantly
When it comes to investing, Germans are still considered risk-averse by international standards. But the rising stock market prices despite the economic crisis obviously have an effect.
According to a YouGov survey, confidence in stocks has increased among the working population in Germany: a quarter of the population now consider stocks to be the most trustworthy investment when it comes to retirement planning. Home ownership is still in first place with 42 percent. The pollsters surveyed 3,748 working people aged 15 and over in the summer. The client was HDI Insurance, which published the annual career study.
Stocks overtake statutory pensions
In a multi-year comparison, confidence in stocks has increased, while the popularity of owning your own property has decreased. In 2020, 51 percent said their own house or apartment seemed most trustworthy, followed by the statutory pension and rented properties at 22 percent each. In 2020, stocks were still behind at 19 percent. This year, however, stocks overtook both statutory pensions at 25 percent, and rented real estate, life insurance and company pensions also performed worse than the stock market.
HDI board member Holm Diez viewed this as “all the more remarkable given the fact that German savers have previously been strongly influenced by the security aspect in financial matters.” According to the HDI, it is also striking that the middle and older generations aged 45 and over now have less confidence in the statutory pension: in 2020, 30 percent of employees in this age group had the highest confidence in the statutory pension, this year it’s still 20 percent.
Women less suspicious of stocks
A key reason for the changed view of the stock market is that, according to the survey, women who are cautious about financial matters now view stocks with less mistrust. In a direct comparison with the previous year 2023, 19 percent of the female employees surveyed now said that they had the greatest confidence in stocks, a third more than before. For men, this increase was much smaller, increasing from 28 to 29 percent.
The Frankfurt Dax, Germany’s leading index, stood at a good 13,000 points at the end of 2019. Apart from a setback in 2022, it has risen almost continuously since then until the threshold of 20,000 points was exceeded for the first time at the beginning of December. The economic crisis of the past two years has not yet harmed stock market prices, although profits have collapsed in many sectors of the economy.
dpa
Source: Stern
