This collaboration between NZSA and University of Canterbury (UC) Business School is part of our mission to promote a thriving market and to be the voice of investors. A sentiment index will contribute to the understanding of investor behaviour and the overall market and allow you to get first access to the data and make better-informed investment decisions.
Have your say!
Each week, a random selection of NZSA members are sent an email to complete the survey. If you wish to participate in the NZ Investor Sentiment Index Survey anyway, you can click on this link anytime – also contained in each Briefing newsletter. The sentiment survey is conducted weekly from Thursday 12:01am to Wednesday 11:45pm.
This Week’s Results:
The “amber” section of these dials show the middle quartiles (ie, 25th – 75th percentile) since the NZSA / UC Retail Investor Sentiment survey began in 2020.
This week’s commentary – December 18th, 2024
- Bullish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, increased by 33.3 percentage points to 60.0%.
- Neutral sentiment, expectations that stock prices will essentially stay unchanged over the next six months, decreased by 26.7 percentage points to 40.0%.
- Bearish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, decreased by 6.7 percentage points to 0.0%.
- The level of optimism among individual investors is highest for primary sector and energy (both at 66.7%), followed by industrials (33.3%). The level of optimism is lowest for financials (11.1%), followed by IT and consumer discretionary (both at 22.2%).
- The level of neutral sentiment is highest for consumer discretionary, IT and financials (all at 66.7%). Neutral sentiment is lowest for energy and primary sector (both at 33.3%), followed by industrials (44.4%).
- The level of pessimism is highest for health care (25.0%), followed by financials and industrials (22.2%). Pessimism is lowest for primary sector and energy (both at 0.0%), followed by real estate (11.1%).
- Bullish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, increased by 20.0 percentage points to 66.7% for Australian stocks and by 11.1 percentage points to 77.8% for U.S. stocks.
- Neutral sentiment, expectations that stock prices will stay flat over the next six months, decreased by 13.3% at 33.3% for Australian stocks and increased by 2.2 percentage points to 22.2% for U.S. stocks.
- Bearish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, decreased by 6.7 percentage points to 0.0% for Australian stocks and by 13.3 percentage points to 0.0% for U.S. stocks.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their small cap shares decreased by 23.3 percentage points to 10.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their large cap shares increased by 26.7 percentage points to 40.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their funds decreased by 13.3 percentage points to 20.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating no change in their equity allocation increased by 6.7 percentage points to 20.0% this week.
- The proportion of investors who express uncertainty about their equity allocation increased by 3.3 percentage points to 10.0% this week.
Six-week Retail Investor Sentiment – NZ50 Index
Historic Data
There have been wide variations since the survey began (January 2020) in Investor Sentiment. The following chart shows:
- the lowest recorded response for each type of sentiment (the lower ‘whisker’)
- the recorded responses between 25th – 75th percentile (the ‘box’)
- the median response score – ie, exactly 50% of scores are above and below this number
- the maximum response
- Interestingly, NZ Investors have displayed a greater tendency towards expressing “negative” (bearish) sentiment since the survey’s inception.