"Believe it or not there's a lot of money out there," an authorised financial adviser (AFA) told me in a carpark conversation last week, "only, people are too scared to anything with it."
Most of the money is here sitting in bank cash or term deposit accounts,
slowly compounding in line with the low interest rates on offer.
"People would rather suck up the 4 (or so) per cent than risk losing capital," the AFA said.
As at September this year, bank deposits accounted for over $101 billion of household savings, up $10 billion from two years ago and more than $35 billion compared to September 2006.
On a similar five-year timescale the amount of money households have invested in managed funds (excluding investments via superannuation, KiwiSaver and life companies) has grown, barely, from $26.2 billion in June 2006 to $26.5 billion in June 2011.
