High net worth individuals to ramp up investments

Watch this space because 2016 is expected to see a significant increase in contributions to investment portfolios

The first half of 2016 is expected to be highly significant for investments, at least if a new poll is to be believed.

According to the results of a survey by the deVere Group, 76 per cent of high net worth respondents will increase investments during the opening six months of 2016 – with a tenth claiming they were “unsure” and 14 per cent suggesting they had no plans to invest any further during this period.

The survey, which polled 767 investors globally with assets of more than $1.4m, points to a strong appetite among investors to make use of the cash that they had previously held in reserve.

DeVere chief executive Nigel Green commented that investors are “aware of the opportunities to buy high quality equities at the prices they want to pay”. It is believed they see many favourable opportunities to boost their portfolios over the long term.

“It is a sound investment strategy to put new cash to use in the market while prices are relatively low,” Green added. “Capitalising like this on the attractive long-term performance of stock markets is a time-honoured way that investors can successfully build wealth.

“No-one can predict exactly what the markets will do in the immediate future and it’s too early to say if this is or isn’t the bottom of the market.  But our poll suggests that high-net-worth investors believe that it is close to the bottom and that there are major buying opportunities.

“It would appear that many high-net-worth individuals kept their powder dry during 2015, as the markets rose then fell and as we braced ourselves for the first Fed rate hike in almost a decade. But any qualms they might have had last year are now countered by more attractive prices.  

“They are moving away from a preservation approach by diversifying their investment portfolios. As shown by decades of financial market data, this is the correct approach to risk management.”

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