Qatar, Kuwait, and the UAE are among the top six countries that have the highest concentration of millionaire households, while Saudi Arabia topped the list for ultra-high-net-worth households, said a report.

Singapore continued to have the highest concentration of millionaire households, with 15.5 percent of all households having at least $1 million in assets under management (AuM), added the annual global wealth report titled ‘Shaping a New Tomorrow: How to Capitalize on the Momentum of Change’ by the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).

Switzerland had the highest concentration of millionaire households in Europe and the second-highest overall, at 9.9 per cent, it said.

This year, BCG published figures on the countries with the highest number of “ultra-high-net-worth” (UHNW) households, defined as those with more than $100 million in AuM.

Saudi Arabia had the highest concentration of UHNW households, measured per 100,000 households, at 18, followed by Switzerland (10), Hong Kong (9), Kuwait (8), and Austria (8). China experienced the fastest growth in the number of super-wealthy households, which jumped by more than 30 per cent to 393.

Global wealth recovery

Middle East and Africa recorded a wealth growth of 8.6 per cent, above the global average of 8.0 per cent in 2010 to $9 trillion.

North America had the largest absolute gain of any regional wealth market in assets under management (AuM), at $3.6 trillion, and the second-highest growth rate, at 10.2 per cent. Its $38.2 trillion in AuM made it the world’s richest region, with nearly one-third of global wealth.

In Europe, wealth grew at a below-average rate of 4.8 per cent, but the region still had a gain of $1.7 trillion in AuM.

Wealth grew fastest in Asia-Pacific (excluding Japan), at a 17.1 percent rate, whereas in Latin America, wealth grew by 8.2 per cent.

In terms of individual countries, the nations showing the largest absolute gains in wealth were the US, China, the UK and India.

The strong performance of the financial markets accounted for the lion’s share (59 per cent) of the growth in AuM, the report said.

“During the crisis, cash was king,” said Monish Kumar, a BCG senior partner and a coauthor of the report.

“Since then, clients have been steering their assets back into riskier investments.” North America continued to have the highest proportion of wealth held in equities—44 percent, up from 41 percent in 2009.

“The wealth management industry has overcome tremendous adversity over the past several years, and the sustained recovery of global wealth bodes well for its future,” added Kumar, who is the global leader of asset and wealth management at BCG.

“But the positive signs should not be misread as a return to normal. A number of disruptive forces, including increased regulatory oversight and changes in client behavior, are rewriting the rules of the game—both literally and figuratively.”

Millionaire households grow

Millionaire households represented just 0.9 per cent of all households but owned 39 per cent of global wealth, up from 37 per cent in 2009. The number of millionaire households increased by 12.2 per cent in 2010 to about 12.5 million.

The US had by far the most millionaire households (5.2 million), followed by Japan, China, the UK and Germany.

The proportion of wealth owned by millionaire households increased the most in Asia-Pacific, at 2.9 percentage points, followed by North America, at 1.3 percentage points.

The country with the fastest-growing number of millionaire households was Singapore, with 170,000—up nearly a third from 2009, the report said.

The US had the largest number of these super-wealthy households (2,692).

Outlook

Tjun Tang, another BCG partner who worked on the report, said that the firm expects global wealth to grow at a compound annual rate of 5.9 per cent from year-end 2010 through 2015—to about $162 trillion—driven by the performance of the capital markets and the growth of GDP in countries around the world.

Wealth will grow fastest in emerging markets. In India and China, for example, it is expected to increase at a compound annual rate of 18 per cent and 14 per cent, respectively.

As a result, the Asia-Pacific region’s share of global wealth is projected to rise from 18 per cent in 2010 to 23 per cent in 2015, the study said. – TradeArabia News Service