We recently published a paper, Share ownership: For the many, not the few, based on a statistical survey of share ownership, produced jointly with Argus Vickers, the share analysis service. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has now issued its equivalent survey. This paper compares its results with ours. Although there are, inevitably, differences in the detail, the two surveys reach the same conclusions.
The two key themes from the surveys are that: i) investors from the Rest of the World (RoW) dominate the main market; and ii) individual investors are becoming more important. Indeed, the ONS work suggests that retail is far more important than even we have given it credit for.
Watch our video interview on the original paper below, and read the full update here.