Nation of investors doubles down

Despite high inflation and financial uncertainty, Aussies have put trillions of dollars into property, shares and super

- Alex Dunnin

It may come as a surprise to learn that Australians have more than $6 trillion invested in superannuation accounts, residential investment housing, platform wraps and managed funds. This is despite recessionary fears as a result of the currently high, albeit receding, inflation and the high interest rates that have been unleashed to tame it. The amount is more than triple the size of Australia’s annual GDP.

Analysis by Rainmaker Information, which publishes Money magazine, shows that in the past year, Australians topped up these investments by more than $600 billion – not counting new residential housing investments.

To understand the nation’s economy, we need to understand how these investments are made, by whom and what they are choosing.

To help us do this, the ASX has just published its latest annual Australian Investor Study. Based on a survey of 5500 adults, it serves as a good reality check.

The first thing to accept is that the study blurs retail consumer investors with members of self-managed super funds (SMSF). Maybe this can’t be helped, but it does potentially distort some of the results, given these SMSF portfolios are so large.

Nevertheless, the study reveals about half of Australia’s adults are investors. It claims 10 million people in this mix invest outside their main home and mainstream (non-SMSF) super fund.

Property tops the list