The Swiss bank's in-house research unit examines wealth trends across the world.

A report by Credit Suisse’s in-house think tank shows that global wealth edged higher by $3.5 trillion to reach $256 trillion in mid-2016, a gain of 1.4 per cent year-on-year, matching the expansion of the global population, while currency moves hit every region with the noted exceptions of Asia and North America.

The figures from the Global Wealth Report, produced by the Credit Suisse Research Institute, show Asia-Pacific (up 8.3 per cent from 2015) set the pace for wealth growth, at $53.465 trillion. Africa suffered the largest percentage fall, down to $2.503 trillion, highlighting the sharp contrast between these regions.

The report said growth in wealth “has fallen but we expect moderate acceleration and estimate that total global wealth will reach $334 trillion by 2021”. China is expected to contribute more than half of the forecast growth in emerging economies, while more than 7 per cent will come from India, it said.  

As far as the richest citizens are concerned, since 2000 the number of millionaires globally has increased by 155 per cent, the report said, while the number of ultra-high net worth individuals has risen by 216 per cent, a shift explaining a perception of expanding inequality.

The 12.4 million millionaires in the world in 2000 were heavily concentrated (96 per cent) in high-income economies. Since that time 20 million “new millionaires” have been added to this total, of whom approximately 2.6 million – 13 per cent of the total additions – come from emerging economies.

The number of millionaires is projected to reach 45.1 million by 2021, while the number of UHNW individuals could reach 208,000, up from 141,000, Credit Suisse’s think tank said.

North America, Brexit and Switzerland
North America – up 2.0 per cent – is the world’s wealthiest region, at $92.381 trillion; Europe is second, at $73.305 trillion, followed by Asia (as previously shown). China accounts for $23.393 trillion of wealth, a figure that fell 2.8 per cent in 2016 from a year earlier.

The UK saw total wealth drop by $1.5 trillion, which the report said was caused by the post-Brexit fall in exchange rates and associated impact on equities. The referendum was held on 23 June, just a few days prior to the half-way point of the calendar year.

The study showed the impact of currency movements, which caused wealth to fall in every region except Asia-Pacific and North America. The highest rise in wealth amongst individual countries was achieved by Japan with a total increase of $3.9 trillion, followed by a $1.7 trillion rise in the US.

Switzerland again topped the rankings in terms of average wealth per adult. Since the turn of the century, wealth per adult in Switzerland has risen by 142 per cent to $561,900, putting the country at the top of the global rankings by a large margin. However, most of the rise was due to appreciation of the Swiss franc against the US dollar from 2001 to 2013. Measured in Swiss francs, household wealth rose 44 per cent from 2000 to 2016 – an average annual rate of 2.3 per cent.

The report was drawn from wealth holdings of 4.8 billion households in more than 200 nations.