UK STOCK MARKET STATISTICS

SOME BACKGROUND INFORMATION

UK Statistics

This page contains some background information on the UK stock market, and the investors in it, including the role of individual investors. There are two problems with obtaining and analysing this information. One is the difficulty that many shares are now held in nominee accounts, so identifying the beneficial owners is not easy. The second problem is that the sources of such information are patchy and often out of date. But here is what is known:

2020 has so far seen a strong increase in retail investor activity with platforms such as Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell and Interactive Investor experiencing increases in new account openings and inactive accounts reactivating. It is estimated that during March and April 2020 20% of the volume of the FTSE All Share was from retail investors, with over 60% being ‘buy’ orders.

At the end of 2018 UK-resident individuals held 13.5% of the UK stock market, up by 1.2% from 2016 and moving away from the historical lows of 10.2% in 2008^[1]. In 2020 the Financial Times estimated that 15% of the UK stock market is held by individual shareholders, in 1963 that number was 50%^[2].

The latest ONS data^[3], at the end of 2020, reports individuals’ shareholdings stood at 12.0%, down from 13.3% in 2018. The reasons for the reported sharp decrease are unclear. The 13.3 2018 has been restated, it was previously published at 13.5%). The Covid pandemic has been widely linked to increases in individuals starting to invest and hence in share ownership. It is too early for such effects to be seen in the ONS data and also the impact of the recent cost of living crisis on savings levels remains to be seen. Another issue is whether individuals in the UK have diversified their portfolios and now own less UK stocks and more overseas stocks.

The long term trend of declining individual share ownership from more than 50% of the market post WWII is clear, but since the 2008 financial crisis it remains to be seen whether this trend may have reversed or whether the immediate increase post Covid was a temporary reversal of trend.

Retail investors are especially important shareholders for small and mid-cap companies where the ownership rises to 25% of companies listed on the London Stock Exchange’s growth market, AIM^[4].

In Europe (including the UK) households own 15.6% of listed shares up from 12.7% in 2007^[5]. In Australia the ASX Investor Study 2017 shows that 31% of Australians hold shares directly with the % of younger investors growing^[6]. In the United States 37.6% of individuals own stocks^[7].

In 2020 the largest proportion of UK shares were held by the rest of the world.

Impact of Nominee Accounts

Nominee accounts and the issue of shareholder rights for those who hold shares in nominee accounts is an important campaign for ShareSoc.

A submission by APCIMS to the Kay Review (based on work by Cass Business School in 2011) suggested that retail shareholders accounted for about 30% of the ownership of FTSE100 companies although it seems likely they took indirect ownership via unit trusts, OEICs, investment trusts and personal pensions into account. It is possible that the aforementioned trend simply represents the migration of shareholders into nominee accounts and into funds and SIPPs. It is likely the 30% is a more accurate representation of the interest of individuals in stock market investment.

Surveys by BIS in 2016 identified that between 3-4% of retail investors hold shares in a personal CREST account. The same report estimated that there are approximately 20,000 CREST personal members nationally, out of an estimated 12 million -13 million retail shareholders in the UK. The Law Commission provided updated statistics in their November 2020 Intermediated Securities Scoping Paper, noting that the number of individuals holding securities directly through CREST has decreased from approximately 50,000 members in 2003 to 4,200 members in 2020.

Meanwhile, the popularity of retail platforms continues to grow, as detailed in UK Secondary Capital Raising Review, Annex H, which details 2.5 million accounts held in Hargreaves Lansdown, Interactive Investor and AJ Bell. In addition, Freetrade have over 1 million accounts, so ShareSoc estimate there are over 5 million platform accounts. Obviously, there is some overlap between the owners of accounts, but we have seen no data on the degree of overlap.

Share Trading Volumes

In 2004 the LSE reported some figures on share trading volumes and at that time private clients created 65% of trades by volume, but only 8% by value. But it is known that the proportion of accounts held by traditional stockbrokers for clients which are “advisory” was falling as opposed to “discretionary” accounts. In other words, fewer and fewer people were making their own investment decisions at that time.

Household Share Ownership

In 2005/6 a survey by the Department of Work and Pensions suggested that 20% of UK households held shares (that suggests as many as 10 million people), but the vast majority held only a few shares which were rarely traded. A survey by Mori in 2002 indicated that 22% of adults held shares, but 12% held only privatised or demutualised shares. The median value of share portfolios was about £5,000 and the median number of companies held was only 3. In 2015 a BIS Department Consumer Omnibus Survey confirmed that 20% of the public held shares directly or via ISAs/SIPPs, equivalent to about 12 million people at that time (see the Paper entitled “Research on the Intermediated Shareholding Model”).

According to the submission by the Shareholder Rights Working Group to the DTI in 2005, there were approximately 4 million people holding nominee accounts, with 23 million shareholdings in those accounts. There were about 40,000 personal Crest members in 2001, with an average value of about £50,000 so these are clearly more substantial investors. But that had fallen to 20,000 investors by 2015 according to the research paper published by the BIS Department. In addition to those numbers there are many people who hold shares in “certificated” form, particularly demutualisation or privatisation holdings. The BIS Paper mentioned above gives more information on the background of investors, how frequently they trade and how they hold their shares.

Retail Investor Accounts

The APCIMS submission to the Kay Review in 2011 suggested there were now 6 million retail investor accounts (although some people may have been holding more than one account). This is supported by information from Compeer published in 2012 who reported that there were 3.5 million execution only nominee accounts, up from 1 million in 2003 – this shows the growth in the use of execution only trading and nominee accounts.

Another statistic that gives figures for the number of private investors is the data for ISA holders. Based on figures from HMRC which are published annually, there were 22.2 million adult ISA holders at the end of 2022, with average savings of £29,387. At the end of 2021 to 2022 the market value of Adult ISA holdings stood at £741.6 billion. This is an 8% increase compared to the value at the end of 2020 to 2021. This was driven by a 14% increase in the market value of funds held in Stocks and Shares ISAs. Stocks and shares ISA holdings account for 62% of the market value of ISAfunds, an increase from 58% in 2020 to 2021. Cash ISAs account for 38% of the market value, a decrease from 42% in 2020 to 2021.

Chart 1 below shows that around 11.8 million Adult ISA accounts were subscribed to in 2021 to 2022, slightly down from 12.2 million in 2020 to 2021. The number of cash ISAs subscribed to decreased by 920,000 compared to 2020 to 2021. The number subscribing to stocks and shares ISAs increased by around 345,000. The share of accounts subscribed to in cash has fallen to 61% of accounts, compared to 66% in 2020 to 2021.

Chart 1: Number of Adult ISA accounts subscribed to during the financial year

Around 1.2m Junior ISA accounts were subscribed to in 2021 to 2022, the tenth full financial year since the scheme was launched, up from 955,000 in 2020 to 2021.

Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/annual-savings-statistics-2023/commentary-for-annual-savings-statistics-june-2023

More information on this can be found within our Shareholder Rights Campaign.

¹ https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/investmentspensionsandtrusts/bulletins/ownershipofukquotedshares/2018#main-points
² https://www.ft.com/content/b9255dab-385d-4182-8c44-200948bfaae2
³https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/investmentspensionsandtrusts/bulletins/ownershipofukquotedshares/2020
⁴ https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/investmentspensionsandtrusts/bulletins/ownershipofukquotedshares/2018#main-points
⁵ Eurostat database, annual sector accounts, financial flows and stocks.
⁶ https://www.asx.com.au/content/dam/asx/about/media-releases/2017/asx-australian-investor-study-2017-media-release.pdf
⁷ https://www.sifma.org/resources/research/who-owns-stocks-in-america/

Updated: 28 August 2023

Group description:	The National Group is open to all members of SIGnet. It is intended primarily for new SIGnet members, who may not yet have found another suitable group to join. We aim to welcome new members and discuss their investment interests and current investment topics. Investors with all levels of experience are welcome to join.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Online
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	The National Group meets monthly, on a weekday evening. Meetings are generally from 7-8:30pm.

Group description:	Our group is a broad church that contains investors of varying age and experience. We discuss stocks and investment trusts that we have bought, sold or are interested in and the reasons behind our decisions, and try to make sense of the ever changing investment environment. Our members backgrounds are diverse and include corporate banking, engineering, teaching and the leisure industry. Discussions are robust and challenging but tend to be to be informal, and do not generally involve agendas, presentations or detailed preparation. We are a friendly and approachable group who welcome investors of all levels – we just ask that you contribute, at whatever level you can.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Our meetings are held in a very nice pub near to South Ealing tube station (Piccadilly Line), not far from Ealing Broadway (District, Central and Elizabeth Line). Group numbers permitting (and assuming members are happy to purchase food and drink from the bar), we may also have access to a private room in the pub.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	We meet every 2 months, usually on a Wednesday morning at 11am.

Group description:	An online group for those who already have some experience in investing. Covering topics such as finding companies to invest in, financial statements and ratios, valuation / margin of safety, analysis of companies and investment trusts and exchange traded funds.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Online using Zoom.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Meetings are usually held on the 3rd Thursday of the month at 7:15pm.

Group description:	An online group for those who are new to investing. Including topics such as how to buy and sell shares, unit trusts, investment trusts, exchange traded funds and diversification, tax and how to save it, pensions, portfolio management and research tools, other asset classes and basic technical analysis.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Online using Zoom.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Meetings are usually held on the 1st Monday of the month at 7:15pm.

Group description:	This group was formed in September 2023 and meets in-person during the evening in a London pub. The group is open to all investors – a good proportion of the initial membership are experienced investors.
Meeting Type/Venue:	In-person meetings. Pub. Dinner and drinks.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Monthly on the third Tuesday of the month from 6-9pm.

Group description:	Group focused on active investing, primarily in small / medium cap UK equities.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Regular Zoom meetings interspersed with occasional face to face meetings and social activities in the North West.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Monthly on Saturdays at 10am.

Group description:	Our group covers a wide spectrum of mainly stock market investing and trading from equities – which include shares, ETF’s Investment and Unit Trusts. We normally rotate the meeting chairperson (responsible for creating, with member’s help, suitable agendas) and a meeting presenter (members take it in turns to provide a 15 to 45 minute presentation on a subject of their choice). Various investing topics of interest are regularly discussed such as software, brokers, investing categories and markets and any related topics of interest.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Meetings will be returning to in-person in a private room at a West London golf club, close to an underground station. In the meantime monthly video calls and an in-between meeting email group will continue.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	In-person meetings will be held on the second Wednesday of each month in the afternoons, following a golf club one course lunch.

Group description:	Experienced investors who have been members many years and newer members wanting to learn about investing. Members discuss portfolio content and reasons why they have certain assets and investments. Buys and sells discussed along with interesting shares being considered along with current issues in the market of local or international influence.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Physical face to face meetings held in a central pub in Easton in Gordano.
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Usually monthly to 6 weekly, mid week 12 noon to 2pm with lunch.

Group description:	The Leicester Square Group welcomes investors with all levels of experience, but all members are expected to contribute to our discussions. We discuss/analyse individual stocks, market trends and investment topics. Guest speakers are sometimes invited to address the group. At each meeting all members are asked to inform the group of what stocks or collective investments they’ve been buying or selling, or are considering buying or selling. A friendly and supportive discussion is encouraged. The meeting is punctuated by a lunch break, providing an opportunity to socialise. After the meeting, members may stay on for drinks and to socialise further.
Meeting Type/Venue:	Physical meetings at a central London venue
Meeting Frequency/Timing:	Meets bi-monthly, 11am-4pm on a weekday