Ranked: Top Countries by Stock Market Ownership

Pallavi Rao
2025-04-28 13:11:00
www.visualcapitalist.com

Ranked: Top Countries by Stock Market Ownership

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The rise of no-fee investment platforms have pushed people into the stock market, particularly those under the age of 35.

But some countries have a mature investment landscape, with a higher share of the population already holding invested assets.

We rank the stock ownership rate for 32 countries using data from HelloSafe, a financial services comparison website. They used the latest available figures available at the World Bank from 2023–2024.

This data includes direct shareholding as well as exposure via life insurance and pension funds.

Which Countries Are Most Invested in the Stock Market?

More than half of the American population (55%) is invested in the stock market, the highest for any country in this dataset.

Rank	Country	Region	% of shareholding population	# of shareholders
1	U.S.	Americas	55%	185.4M
2	Canada	Americas	49%	19.1M
3	Australia	Oceania	37%	9.6M
4	UK	Europe	33%	22.1M
5	New Zealand	Oceania	31%	1.6M
6	Sweden	Europe	22%	2.3M
7	Russia	Europe	21%	30.5M
8	Finland	Europe	19%	1.0M
9	Switzerland	Europe	18%	1.5M
10	Ireland	Europe	17%	901K
11	Vietnam	Asia	16%	16.2M
12	Japan	Asia	15%	18.7M
13	France	Europe	15%	10.3M
14	Portugal	Europe	15%	1.5M
15	Germany	Europe	14%	11.8M
16	Netherlands	Europe	14%	2.5M
17	South Africa	Africa	14%	8.5M
18	Hong Kong	Asia	14%	1.0M
19	Taiwan	Asia	13%	2.9M
20	Spain	Europe	13%	5.9M
21	Singapore	Asia	8%	473K
22	Brazil	Americas	8%	17.1M
23	Italy	Europe	7%	4.1M
24	China	Asia	7%	98.7M
25	India	Asia	6%	85.8M
26	Austria	Europe	6%	510K
27	Belgium	Europe	5%	590K
28	Poland	Europe	5%	1.8M
29	Argentina	Americas	5%	2.3M
30	Philippines	Asia	2%	1.8M
31	Mexico	Americas	1%	1.5M
32	Morocco	Africa	1%	190K

Ranked second, 49% of all Canadians are invested, and the two North American countries are far ahead of the rest of the world.

Many of the top 10 countries have public pension funds linked to markets, which may help increase their ownership rates.

Interestingly, the two most populous countries in the world, India and China both have single-digit stock market ownership rates at 6% and 7% respectively.

However even these small shares are large shareholding communities, numbering nearly 100 million each.

Ticket to Turbulence

The first four months of the new Trump presidency has been the single-worst start to a term for financial markets.

Before the newest pause on tariffs, the S&P 500 had lost 15% of its value since January, the most for a new term since the index started in 1957.

However, as the White House reinstated yet another pause on its earlier announced tariffs, markets regained some of its lost ground. (It’s still down 7% YTD as of writing this post).

With more than half of the American population invested, this turbulent ride is being widely felt.

Learn More on the Voronoi App

The S&P 500 has outperformed every other stock exchange in the world since 2015. Check out: Top Countries by Stock Market Returns Since 2015 to see where other top exchanges like the DAX and FTSE rank.

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