Global: Where are consumers least risk-averse when it comes to the stock market?

YouGov Global Profiles is a powerful tool that allows for a global overview of a topic across a range of markets. In this piece, we use the tool to examine the share of people that are open to taking risk in the stock market.

Among the 25 markets we view in this piece, South Africa (online representative sample) has the highest share of consumers who say they “like to take risks in the stock market” at 53%. The only other market where half of consumers indicate an appetite for stock market is India, for which we use an urban representative sample (49%).

Broadly speaking, the shares of consumers who say they like to take risks in the stock market is relatively high in Asian markets, with markets across the breadth of the continent over-indexing on the global average. The UAE (42%), Vietnam (39%), Indonesia (37%), Thailand (37%) and Malaysia (35%) all surpass the global average of 31%. Rates in Singapore (31%) mimic the global average. China (27%) and Japan (15%) are the only Asian markets where a lower share of people than the global average say they like to take risks in the stock market.

Europeans are among the least likely to exhibit an appetite for risk in the stock market. Only a tenth of Croatians and Czech agree with the statement (10%), which grows slightly among the French (13%) and the British (15%). While Germans are the most likely among Europeans to agree with the statement (21%), they are also among the most likely (in Europe and across the globe) to disagree (71%). This is because a very small share of them sits on the fence (8%) compared to other markets.

Other than in Germany, it is only in Britain (72%) and Czech Republic (71%) where at least seven in ten consumers disagree.

Markets in the Americas sit somewhere in the middle. A quarter of US consumers say they like to take risks in the stock market. That share rises to three in ten among Colombians (30%) and Mexicans (30%) but drops to just over a fifth of Brazilians (22%).

This data might be a handy screener for multi-national investment banks and large financial institutions looking to expand, strengthen or even cull their businesses.

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Methodology: YouGov Global Profiles is a globally consistent audience dataset with 1000+ questions across 43 markets. The data is based on continuously collected data from adults aged 16+ years in China and 18+ years in other markets. The sample sizes for YouGov Global Profiles will fluctuate over time, however the minimum sample size is always c.1000. Data from each market uses a nationally representative sample apart from India and UAE, which use urban representative samples, and China, Egypt, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Morocco, Philippines, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam, which use online representative samples. Learn more about Global Profiles.