Women Beat Men by 3% in Investing, Yet Fewer Participate

Women who invest in UK stocks and shares earn slightly higher long-term returns than men, but only about a quarter of women invest at all, according to new data from Fidelity International and Boring Money.

Fidelity's analysis of its personal investing customers over three years found cumulative returns of 50% for women versus 47% for men. The firm did not identify the reason, but Barclays data offers a clue: women trade about half as often as men.

"Male investors trade more than women, chasing higher returns, but women actually get higher returns," said Joanna Floyd, a business psychologist at The Work Psychologists. "The restraint that keeps women out of the market in the first place is the very same thing that rewards them once they are in it."

Only 26% of UK women hold investments, compared with 41% of men, according to a survey by consumer finance website Boring Money. Among those under 45, the gap narrows slightly: 23% of women versus 40% of men.

Gillian Fleming, co-founder of the women-led angel investment firm Mint Ventures, attributed the participation gap to culture. "Men historically have been more likely to make family investment decisions, and women have also historically not owned the balance of wealth, but that is changing now," she said. "Money and wealth creation is not a topic that women often discuss, and we would like to change that."

When women do invest, they tend to spread their money more broadly. Fleming said male investors focus on rate of return, often in technology companies, while women invest across retail, food and drink, health and beauty, and creative industries. Anna Macdonald, investment strategy director at Hargreaves Lansdown, said women "appear to place relatively greater weight on where their money is going and what impact it might have."

Teleri Evans, 33, a civil servant from Cardiff, saved £40,000 by age 33 after starting with a Help to Buy ISA and later a stocks and shares Lifetime ISA at age 25. She credited living at her mother's house and saving the maximum £4,000 a year. "Investing is definitely something that women are talking about more, which is always a good thing," she said.

Jemma Slingo, a pensions and investment specialist at Fidelity, said female investors "appear more likely to connect investing with real-life goals, from building emergency savings to looking after children." Macdonald added that the investment sector "needs to do a better job of making investing feel accessible, relevant and connected to people's own goals and values."

Women in the UK generally have less money to invest because of the gender pay gap. Macdonald said addressing the participation gap "would be good for women's long-term financial resilience and for the UK economy."