Publication date: 12 May 2020

Amid coronavirus-related stock market volatility, from 7 to 10 percent of Russian large- and medium-sized cities’ residents are considering investment opportunities and explain this fact, among others things, by their experience obtained during previous periods of high stock market volatility. Moreover, interest in stock market instruments has increased significantly year-on-year: only 4 percent of Russians showed such interest in April 2019.

Among cities where the willingness to invest is particularly widespread are Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yaroslavl, Perm, and Tyumen.

60 percent of potential investors are interested in stocks and bonds of Russian companies, 20 percent opt for gold. It is worth mentioning that there was a rise in popularity of crypto exchanges and Forex in March 2020.

When asked about main reasons why people take an interest in investing, respondents said that they think about investing as a way to get supplemental income, achieve financial independence, or control income (investing as a business). Many respondents also believe that the current decline in the stock market is the right time to start investing. In this regard, some of them mentioned investing experience gained in 1998, 2009, and 2015.

Such data was obtained by Sberbank during their survey conducted among residents of 37 Russian cities with populations over 500,000.