Cerulli, which interviewed 1,050 retail investors with at least €200,000 (£170,526, $212,514) in investable assets in five European countries, found only the majority of Spanish investors still lack the confidence to construct their own portfolios: only 26% of them feel comfortable doing so.
Many Spanish investors have only recently started investing in liquid instruments, with most still holding the bulk of their savings in deposits.
“In practice, investors might not have the time to build and monitor a portfolio and they do not necessarily believe that they could do so better than their advisors. Nevertheless, they feel that they could get by with a minimum level of guidance,” commented Barbara Wall, managing director at Cerulli.
Though Cerulli’s study was based on data gathered in only five countries, the American consultancy felt confident enough to make a sweeping conclusion: “The high confidence among investors in sophisticated markets reflects the level of financial education in Europe; it also suggests that investors in these countries might have a limited regard for professional advice,” said Wall.
