Hong Kong consumers favour saving over fun

Hong Kong consumers lead the world for their saving and investment mindset, while savers outnumber fun-lovers overall in Asia Pacific.

Market research company GFK has found that 54 per cent of online consumers in Hong Kong “disagree completely” or “disagree somewhat” with the notion of enjoying life today and worrying about savings and investments later.

At the other end of the scale, China has the highest proportion of consumers of the APAC countries surveyed (38 per cent) who favour having fun now, followed by Australians at 32 per cent.

GFK polled more than 27,000 internet users across 22 countries, including Australia, China, Hong Kong, Korea and Japan, to find how strongly they agree or disagree with the statement “I want to enjoy life today and will worry about savings and investments later”.

Internationally, people in favour of saving slightly outnumber the “have fun now” respondents – but the numbers are very close. Hong Kong stands out as the only state where more than half of the online population puts up its hand for saving.

Though 33 per cent of women internationally are happy to worry about financial security later, 40 per cent disagree. Men, however, are more evenly split with 36 per cent agreeing and 35 per cent disagreeing.

Respondents in their 20s are the highest percentage of fun-lovers of any age group, with 41 per cent happy to worry about saving later. Teenagers (15 to 19 years old) and those in their 30s come next, almost equal at 37 and 36 per cent respectively. Of respondents in their 50s and older, 26 per cent also agree with living for today.

Meanwhile, the numbers with a “save now” attitude increase fairly steadily with each age group, starting at 34 per cent for both teenagers and those in their 20s, and peaks at 43 per cent of those in their 50s, and 42 per cent of those older.

“These findings give financial service brands a useful, top-level picture of the differences in attitude toward the concept of savings and investments across countries, age groups and genders,” says GFK APAC chief commercial officer Frans Janssen.