18% WOMEN ARE ACTIVE INVESTORS

Only 18 per cent of single working women make their own investment decisions and 77 per cent of the fairer sex depends on spouse or parents for their investment decisions, says a study. "Only a minuscule 23 per cent of the surveyed working women claim to be sole decision makers, when it comes to making their own investments. "This figure is even lower at 18 per cent when it comes to the proportion of single working women who take their own investment decisions," says a study by mutual fund company DSP BlackRock. According to the study, while 92 per cent of working women claim to be involved in the investment decision-making process, 70 per cent of these women are actually joint decision makers and a majority of these (52 per cent) are only informed about the investment decisions which have already been made. "The main reason why women don’t take investment decisions is that they are safety oriented and reluctant to take risk," the study said. Husbands also seem to dominate the investment decision making among working as well as non-working women, the study, based on the survey conducted across 14 cities, said. When it comes to trusting various financial institutions, it was observed that women trust nationalised banks (88 per cent) almost twice as much as they trust private banks (43 per cent) and foreign banks (24 per cent), it added. While the proportion of sole decision makers among working women is almost similar in metros at 24 per cent and non-metros at 20 per cent, in case of non-working women, sole decision makers are confined mostly to metros, it said. The study titled 'Understanding Women–Usage and attitude towards financial products' covered working and non-working women between 21–60 years of age, and included divorcees and widows. While analysing women's main reasons to invest, it said future security and child's education form the key reasons for investments, especially amongst women in non-metros. The desire to invest with an objective to become rich is higher among women in metros, it said, adding, tax does not feature as a primary reason for investments among many of the women surveyed.