A “new generation of savers” is coming to the stock market. Since the health crisis of 2020, this sector has experienced many upheavals, including the arrival of a young population, in search of profitability, particularly in a context marked by high inflation. In a study published by the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF) on Thursday, the body looks back on these transformations, and indicates that the trend of “the arrival of new investors on the equity markets […] ‘is reinforced over the months’.
If this wave has been at work since 2020, it has since stabilized: now, 50,000 newcomers, with a younger profile, come to invest in the equity markets every quarter. In total, nearly 1.5 million investors have made their first stock market transactions since 2019. Elements from daily transaction reports sent to the AMF by investment services providers.
In detail, in the first half of 2023, 95,500 new individual equity investors were counted, 38.5% of whom were under 35 years old. A record rate, according to the AMF, which must be compared to 12% for the whole of 2019 and 28% in 2020. In addition, the proportion of people under 25 is at an unprecedented level and represents 14.1% of visitors, twice as many as in 2020.
Similarly, in the first half of 2023, more than 53,000 investors “carrying out transactions, buying or selling, on shares” were under the age of 25, compared to just under 13,000 in the first half of 2019. “all retail investors carrying out transactions, buying or selling, on shares, the proportion of under 35s rose to 17.4% at the end of June 2023”, also adds the study. This is the highest level recorded by the stock market. “A clear generational shift has (also) taken place”, sums up the AMF. The under 35s represent almost 20% of equity holders, a level twice as high as in 2015. The share of under 25s, for this aspect, has more than tripled in eight years, to 11 .2%.
This transformation can be explained in particular by the inflationary context, which reduces the attractiveness of regulated savings, certainly secure, but less profitable. Still, this “generational shift” delights the Authority: “This new generation of private investors is an asset for the Paris market”, welcomes the president of the institution, Marie-Anne Barbat-Layani, quoted in the press release.
