Bengaluru: In a recent survey by Scripbox, a leading digital wealth management company, almost 50% of 778 urban women participants claimed that they don’t have enough knowledge about financial planning. The brand decided to conduct a social experiment to understand this better. It brought out the inhibitions that women, in general, have about investing, despite the savviness and confidence of the many women who manage their finances. In the backdrop of International Women’s Day, this stands as a powerful symbol of how women hugely underestimate their own knowledge and capability.
The social experiment begins by describing two personas of successful investors, to two different groups of women. It gives details about the personas on how they manage and invest money efficiently. It also outlines their dreams and aspirations – such as educating their children in Ivy League schools, saving to retire early, and gaining financial independence. The respondents invariably assume that the persons described are financially savvy men – highlighting their inherent beliefs that ‘investing’ is a man’s territory.
Later, in the telling reveal, when asked about how they interpreted the gender-neutral descriptions as that of men, they felt that the financial savviness, aspirational life goals, and wealth creation aims of the person inevitably painted the picture of a successful man in their minds. Scripbox wanted to highlight and call out the existing stereotype that women and financial planning don’t go together and to challenge it in a thought-provoking manner.
Manu Prasad, CMO, Scripbox said, “We believe that wealth management is gender-agnostic and that women are perfectly capable of handling their money and making it work towards their financial goals. But unfortunately, a lot of women don’t give themselves enough credit and have thus created a narrative of this being exclusively a man’s domain. As India’s trusted digital wealth management platform, we wanted to do our bit to break this narrative.”
However, it’s heartening that the survey also reveals how working women have ended up saving more money than usual in the last year. When it comes to key drivers of confidence, 60% of participants confirmed that owning their money and having control of their financial future is key. Consequently, women are more involved in financial planning decisions and are also investing more. They also continue to be less risk-averse with 56% of women preferring fixed income products such as FDs, PPF, LIC, and other tax-saving schemes. Unlike last year, however, women are investing more in mutual funds (36% in 2021 vs. 27% in 2020) and stocks (21% in 2021 vs. 4% in 2020). With this hike in awareness and more women making bolder financial decisions, a change is imminent, and Scripbox is excited to be at the forefront of it all.
