Investors Prefer Equity Over Real Estate

India’s UHNWIs population grew by 116 per cent during 2013-18 with Bengaluru leading the pack

- Yagnesh Kansara

Indian investors’ love towards capital market is well known. Not from today, but from 1875, when Asia’s first stock exchange the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) was established in the financial capital of the country, which is now known as Mumbai. This fact was once again established in the recent report titled ‘The Wealth Report’, released by Knight Frank, a leading global independent property consultancy.

Not only this, based on their investment acumen, Indians are expected to create a bigger fortune in the current calendar year 2019. This can be seen from yet another finding of the report that says India has led the global growth of Ultra High Net Worth Individuals (UHNWIs) with a growth of 116 per cent in billionaire population between 2013 and 2018. As per the Wealth Report, the High Net Worth Individual (HNWI) is classified as someone with a net worth of over US $1 million (approximately `7 crore) excluding their primary residence, while UHNWI is someone with a net worth of over US$ 30 million (approximately `210 crore), excluding their primary residence.

According to the Attitudes Survey, launched in March within the Knight Frank Wealth Report, is based on responses provided by 600 private bankers and wealth advisers who between them manage over US $3 trillion of wealth for their UHNWI clients.

For 2018, Indian respondents to the attitude survey launched along with the wealth report gave thumbs up to equities (30 per cent) and bonds (28 per cent) where respondents to the survey said that their clients preferred these high return investment assets. Real estate with 23 per cent was the third most invested asset class by India’s UHNWIs. Interestingly, liquidity was not the preferred asset, which made up only nine per cent of the total investments of Indian ultra-rich.