UK private wealth portfolios down by up to a third
The real value of UK private wealth portfolios has fallen by as much as one-third on average in the first nine months of this year as investment losses, inflation and the weak pound combined to hammer people’s buying power.
UK wealth management portfolios lost about 10 per cent on average in the year to the end of September, but price rises and the slide in sterling against the US dollar added to the damage, according to research by Asset Risk Consultants (ARC), which analysed the returns of strategies run by more than 100 large UK wealth managers.
The figures underline that the tangible losses on investment portfolios are only a portion of the destruction of real wealth wrought by inflation and currency movements for UK investors this year.
But Harrison added that double counting in the figures was minimal, and it was important to adjust for purchasing power to get an accurate picture.
“The sorts of people who have investment portfolios are also consumers of goods and services that are not included in the inflation basket, and those things have gone up in price a lot more,” he said.
This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Joshua Oliver
