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The stock of household financial assets (in simple terms: savings) continued to grow rapidly in 2024, exceeding HUF 111,200 billion (EUR 277.4 billion) at the end of the year, Világgazdaság reports, citing data published by the Hungarian central bank (Magyar Nemzeti Bank/MNB) on Tuesday.
Based on the central bank’s statistics, the domestic population has never had so much savings before, and the 14 percent growth rate in 2024 is well above inflation. The stock of financial assets held by households has been rising rapidly for many years, with the total savings portfolio more than doubling in size in six years.
The growth rate of the portfolio clearly shows that mutual fund shares were the winner last year, as the amount held by households increased by almost 30% to over HUF 13,550 billion (EUR 33.7 billion) in twelve months.
This means that the size of the portfolio in investment funds is not far behind that of Hungarian government bonds that rose by 11.1%, close to HUF 14 billion (34.9 billion) in 2024.
The stock of deposits with households also grew at an above-average rate of 15%, bringing the total amount of money held in domestic – and to a lesser extent foreign – bank accounts to nearly HUF 16,400 billion (EUR 40.8 billion). What is noteworthy, however, is that the stock of cash held by households grew much more slowly than the average, by 7.6 percent, to just over HUF 6,500 billion (EUR 16 billion).
As for the composition of the portfolio, shares and equities continue to account for the largest share with over 50%.
Mutual funds accounts for 12.2% of the total savings pie.
In deposits, households held 14.7% of financial assets at the end of the year, while the weight of government securities was around 12.5%. Cash, on the other hand, saw its share of the total “melt away” noticeably, from 6.6 to 5.9% over a year.
The stock of household liabilities increased by 9.4% in 2024, close to HUF 16,630 billion (EUR 41.4 billion) at the end of the year. Unsurprisingly, the bulk of this was accounted for by loans from various financial institutions. As a result, the net financial wealth of households, net of liabilities, reached HUF 94,574.5 billion (EUR 235.5 billion) at the end of last year, that in addition to being almost 15 percent higher than at the end of 2023, is also a new record.
Via Világgazdaság, Featured image: Pexels