Alliances and Leicester savings sees stock market falls

Fewer than thirty per cent of people in Britain currently have any sort of stock market investment, a new study from Alliance and Leicester savings suggests.

Of those who do have some form of investment, fewer than ten per cent have any intention of expanding their portfolio between now and July.

68 per cent of people asked said that they preferred to remain cautious about the markets and wait to see what happened.

Sarah Ennion, a product manager at Alliance and Leicester, said:" The research shows that despite recent gains on the stock market, investors are still relatively cautious, particularly when it comes to investing more money."

Also highlighted by the research was the fact that people check their portfolios far more regularly than has previously been thought, with 57 per cent of those asked having checked the performance of their investments in the last six months, and nearly 30 per cent checking since January.

Ms Ennion went on to add that: "If customers want to take advantage of the growth potential offered by stock market based investments, but are wary about losing money, they could consider products that offer them protection against stock market falls. It is encouraging to see that the majority of people are reviewing their investments on a regular basis."