Cost of living and market shocks spike demand for financial advice

deVere affirms that year-on year enquiries from new clients are up more than 25% to August 2022.

Nigel Green, CEO and founder of deVere, commented: “Inflation is stubbornly sitting at multi-decade highs and rising prices are having a real impact on people.

“As finances come under more and more pressure, with households’ and businesses’ daily expenses, savings, and investments increasingly feeling the squeeze, they are turning to advisers.

“They’re looking to see what options they have to ease the burden. They’re looking for financial opportunities to help them raise their standard of living, which for many is currently falling.”

Besides the sharp and painful rise in the cost of living, deVere says there is another major contributing factor that is driving enquiries for financial advice.

Nigel Green continues: “Stock markets have been extremely volatile this year. The MSCI global stock index was down 20.9% for the first half of 2022.

“It follows the impressive performance of markets in 2021, following the peak Covid selloff, which enticed an army of new investors – many of whom might have assumed that valuations would continue to soar in a straight line forever.

“The major market downturn this year, then, would have been an unpleasant surprise to a large proportion of this new cohort, many of whom had invested for the first time.”