On 1 February 2018, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) released a 70 page statistical bulletin on the Wealth in Great Britain covering the period July 2014 to June 2016. The report is based on interviews from a cohort of 20,000 households. Needless to say, the extrapolation of this survey of 20,000 to a UK population with some 27 million households could be prone to significant deviation from reality. The key points from the ONS are summarised for June 2016:
- Aggregate total net wealth of all households in Great Britain was £12.8 trillion, up 15% from the June 2014 figure of £11.1 trillion. Interestingly, this sets in some context, total aggregate household debt of £1.2 trillion and UK government debt at £ 1.8 trillion.
- Median household total net wealth was £259,400, up from £225,100 in the previous period (an increase of 15%).
- The wealth held by the top 10% of households was around five times greater than the wealth of the bottom half of all households combined.
- Aggregate total private pension wealth of all households in Great Britain was £5.3 trillion; this has increased by 20.4% from £4.4 trillion in June 2014.
- 49% of individuals aged 16 to 64 years had some form of active private pension to which they were contributing (up from 44% in the previous period).
- 66% of employees were actively contributing to a private pension scheme compared with 25% of self-employed, with median current pension wealth for employees being £33,000 compared with £21,000 for the self-employed.
- There was a striking increase in the value of net property wealth for households in London compared with all other regions; median net property wealth in London was £351,000, a 33% increase from £263,000 in June 2014.
- Total aggregate debt of all households in Great Britain was £1.23 trillion (a 7% increase from June 2014), of which £1.12 trillion was mortgage debt (6% higher) and £117.0 billion was financial debt (15% higher).
- 49% of the population had some form of financial debt and 35% had some form of property debt. This was stable compared with June 2014, where 48% had some form of financial debt and 36% had property debt.
Cantab Asset Management would be delighted to assist you with your wealth management and financial planning.
Risk warnings
This document has been prepared based on our understanding of current UK law and HM Revenue and Customs practice, both of which may be the subject of change in the future. The opinions expressed herein are those of Cantab Asset Management Ltd and should not be construed as investment advice. Cantab Asset Management Ltd is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. As with all equity-based and bond-based investments, the value and the income therefrom can fall as well as rise and you may not get back all the money that you invested. The value of overseas securities will be influenced by the exchange rate used to convert these to sterling. Investments in stocks and shares should therefore be viewed as a medium to long-term investment. Past performance is not a guide to the future. It is important to note that in selecting ESG investments, a screening out process has taken place which eliminates many investments potentially providing good financial returns. By reducing the universe of possible investments, the investment performance of ESG portfolios might be less than that potentially produced by selecting from the larger unscreened universe.
