Millennial investors are suffering a media pile-on. In the wake of a survey showing they are leery of stocks, they’ve been branded “financial Neanderthals” whose psyches are scarred by “sustained financial blows that could forever shape their investing mindset.” Because they prefer safe, low-yielding investments, the line goes, these feckless youth have doomed their retirements.
Except they haven’t. Millennials may talk the anti-stock talk, but their retirement savings tell a different tale. While a Gallup poll found that this younger cohort views stocks with fear and loathing, data from Fidelity Investments, the largest 401(k) provider in the U.S., finds them embracing stocks. Millennial retirement plans are 84 percent equities, Fidelity says. That embrace may be inadvertent, as many younger workers are automatically enrolled in target-date funds which automatically lower workers’ stock exposure as they approach retirement. But whether millennials know it or not, many of them are making the right long-term moves in their retirement accounts. The finger-pointing belongs elsewhere — with their parents and grandparents.
Read more at Bloomberg.
