If Canadians knew how to invest we would ... but we don't
Tags: Investing, Personal Finance
We all love spending the hard-earned rewards of our daily toil, but Canadians, of all ages, have something else in common when it comes to our money: We don’t like investing.
A report this week by Investor Education Fund (IEF) explored the reasons why Canadians, from every age bracket, shy away from investments as simple as those made through a Tax Free Savings Account.
Sixty-four of Millennials surveyed say they don’t understand the terms used by their investment advisors. This would suggest that although young money-makers are coming in ignorant, their advisors aren’t treating them as such. While a mandatory Civics class tortured every Ontario high school student, the same is not true for Finance. Such courses are optional, if available at all.
Of those surveyed from the ages of 30-to-49, 57 percent of them said they simply had no time to focus on investments, since they were in their core-career years.
Those surveyed over the age of 50, neglect to invest through lack of trust. Forty percent say they are confused by too much conflicting information, and don’t know what to believe in the media. And 36 percent are unsure where they might find solid, unbiased information on investing.
The most consistent worries across all age groups were the overwhelming flood of information, and the lack of investor knowledge to be able to analyze it properly.
“These results tell us that Canadians who come to our website are overwhelmed about investing and struggle to get the information they need from other sources,” says Tom Hamza, President of IEF.
The report’s survey included 1001 participants, 53 percent of whom were from Ontario.
All of this suggests that Canadians lack a unified and trusted source for this type of information, and that, feeling blind, they cannot take on risk with any degree of confidence.
The IEF study identifies online learning as an effective catalyst for changing investment behaviour. The IEF runs GetSmarterAboutMoney.ca, a website directly focused on consumer-grade financial education.
Watch the video here:
http://www.bnn.ca/News/2014/11/14/If-Canadians-knew-how-to-invest-we-would-but-we-dont.aspx
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