World's wealthiest investors prefer local opportunities

It is only the home turf that the world's wealthiest investors would trust their money with, especially entrepreneurs from the Asia-Pacific region.

That's the conclusion of a survey on investment preferences of ultra affluent investors and entrepreneurs conducted by the Citigroup and McKinsey & Company.

It revealed that investors in the Asia Pacific were being lured by local investment opportunities and were eager to learn what the options are to invest locally.

The survey consisted of investors with a net worth of more than $25 million and more than 60 per cent of survey participants had a net worth in excess of $100 million.

It is a compilation of findings from 120 in-depth, one-on-one interviews, with investors in the US, Latin America, Europe, the West Asia and the Asia Pacific region.

"While every wealthy family is unique and may reach decisions somewhat differently, the survey results reveal clear, regional preferences in investing and some dominant attitudes toward wealth," said Todd S.

Thomson, CEO of Citigroup Global Wealth Management. "To see past the clich"�s regarding global wealth, we think this survey is a valuable tool to help us understand how people from different parts of the world plan their investments, how they make decisions, and what they hope to achieve with their wealth," he said.

The survey also found that compared to other regions, American investors have the strongest demand for alternative products.

While, investors from West Asia prefer real estate and capital protected products, Europeans were mostly interested in investing on hard assets like artworks or real estate.

Latin American entrepreneurs believed that the strength of financial institution was the most important factor for their investment, the survey said.

The survey also found that ultra-affluent investors were at the same risks as general population while making investment choices. it said they were likely to chase riskier short-term performance (both across asset classes and between investment managers) or try to time the market.

They may underweight unfamiliar asset classes in their investment portfolios. Surprisingly, few ultra-affluent investors focus on asset allocation as an important wealth management tool; like lower-tier investors, the wealthy appear to be largely unaware of or not convinced of the benefits of strategic asset allocation, the survey said.