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Well, millionaires of the world, your club has become a bit less elite. The number of millionaires across the globe rose by an astounding 17% in 2009, according to the 14th annual "World Wealth Report" published by Merrill Lynch and Capgemini SA. That's a lot of wealth in a time of global economic crisis. But first, what defines a millionaire? No, having a baseball-card collection that might fetch that kind of a price tag doesn't count (unfortunately). The way the Merrill study defines it is those households with at least $1 million in investable assets, not including primary residences. There are now 10 million of these households in the world, up from 8.6 million in 2008.
The Asia-Pacific region (Hong Kong in particular) saw growth of 26% to 3 million households, matching Europe. North America saw its number of millionaires grow by 17% to 3.1 million (2.87 million of which are in the U.S.). One Merrill spokesman noted that while the world's wealthy have been more conservative with their investments of late, they have returned to the markets. Collective wealth held by this group rose 19% to $39 trillion (that's a "T") after falling more than 19% during the 2008 market pullback and credit crisis.
The wealthy were spending their money on making more money, as equity holdings rose to 29% from 25% the previous year and cash holdings dropped to 17% from 21%. One sector that hasn't bounced back as quickly is luxury goods, such as art, though the second half of 2009 saw increased demand.
What the survey didn't seem to mention, of course, was the number of people who dipped below the poverty line last year.
Beth is senior editor for The Options News Network (www.ONN.tv), which provides daily stock and options commentary. The above comments are not intended as trading advice.
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