More than half of Aussies lose confidence in super
More than half of Australians (54%) have admitted that they will not rely on their superannuation alone for a comfortable retirement, and instead are planning to “explore new ways to expand their wealth”, while only 5% said they believe a financial planner is the answer.
The findings from the YouGov research commissioned by wealth platform Dacxi confirmed that the results were worrying, given that Australians were the fourth largest holders of pension fund assets in the world with $3.5 trillion invested as superannuation assets.
According to Dacxi’s chief executive, Ian Lowe, Australians would need a high performance investment strategy as only 5% of them saw having a financial planner as an avenue to grow their wealth, due to partial loss of trust and the growing cost of financial advice.
Instead, Australians were looking to generational wealth transfer as one of the options and when calculating their own retirement more than one in three respondents said they were taking into consideration any inheritance(s) from any family members. Also, property ownership was considered as the one of the best indicators of ability to grow wealth.
According to the data, the superannuation funds were not immune from downward economic pressures with a single-strategy, default workplace superannuation products now expected to deliver a median loss of 2.8% for the 2021–22 financial year.
Also, only 29% said they would feel comfortable retiring by the traditional age of 65, with women being way more pessimistic than men. The data showed that 64% of women felt they could not rely on their superannuation to retire comfortably compared to 45% of men.
On top of that, Queenslanders were the most pessimistic while the residents of South Australia proved to be the least pessimistic with regards to the comfort of their retirement their superannuation would offer.
Lowe also stressed that Australians tended to rely more on their own knowledge when it came to investing and that the investment landscape had significantly changed over the last few years.
“The everyday Australian can now access tokenised precious metals for example. Gold has been used to hedge against inflation for decades, and is even more relevant for diversified investment with so much uncertainty in equities, bonds and other asset classes. Tokenised gold and other precious metals comes with storage, independent custodianship and insurance baked in, making it safe and accessible to everyone. How many financial advisors are knowledgeable of these strategies today?” Lowe said.
“When it comes to wealth in retirement, our research indicates that most Australians are now relying on their own investment knowledge and the wealth of their immediate family to reach their retirement goal. The first takeaway is that superannuation alone is widely believed to not provide for a comfortable retirement. Investors are more motivated than ever before to explore new strategies and invest across a broader spectrum of asset classes.
“The second is the need for access to sound financial educational resources that will help investors make informed decisions.”
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