Check out my article on the Philippine results of an 11-country Citibank survey on financial intelligence. The results were very revealing, and quantified in figures what we all suspected.
Here’s the link:
8 out of 10 Filipinos worry about bleak retirement--survey
And here’s an excerpt:
MANILA, Philippines – Eight out of ten working, middle class Filipinos believe they face a bleak retirement and more than half expect to be supported by their children in their old age, results of a Citibank survey showed.
The Philippines is one of the 11 countries where Citibank decided to conduct a survey called Citi Fin-Q to measure financial intelligence among consumers. The Philippines is the third country to come out with the survey results after Indonesia and Australia. The rest of the results will be released in March.
Citibank interviewed 400 respondents living in the Philippines who either had a bank account or a credit card. Respondents earned P30,000 per month on the average and two-thirds of them were below 40 years old. They were asked to answer questions on their outlook for their financial future, their approaches to budgeting and saving and whether they have a formal financial plan, among others.
The survey revealed that only 36 percent of working, middle class Filipinos save regularly every month while 51 percent “save when they can”. Nine out of 10 attempt to follow a budget, but only 33 percent stick to it.
Another article on the same subject from Doris Dumlao of Philippine Daily Inquirer can be found here:
Filipinos have low financial IQ--says bank
Both articles are in the ten most-read stories in the INQUIRER.net’s business section. I hope that means Filipinos are paying attention. Feel free to forward these articles to your friends, colleagues and family using the “Send as an email” feature from INQUIRER.net. If you want to blog about these articles, please feel free but please follow the rules of propriety and add links to both the article and this blog post to give due credit to this publication.
While I was going through my notes, I found these other snippets of information that may be useful but were not included in the articles:
• 77% seem to be optimistic about their future, but few seem financially secure.
• More than 6 out of 10 are not confident their savings will enable them to meet their financial commitments
• 2 out of 5 have job security concerns
• Filipinos are generally pragmatic and appreciate the value of savings. But minority or 36% save as a habit
• Learning to manage cash flow is a concern
• 40% cannot pay credit card balances in full thus financial protection and independence are dire needs that are set aside
• only 32% have enough insurance. Insurance to meet health needs and protect income in time of emergencies are lacking
• retirement planning is poor. 17% have no idea how much they will need to retire and 28% have not started planning at all. Only 16% have a retirement plan
• as much as 53% feel they have average or poor overall level of understanding a out money management and finances
• less than 10% leverage on the benefit of expert guidance from finance professionals who can teach them proper planning
• individuals who understand proper financial planning are better in their approach towards expense management and saving and are more satisfied with their quality of life.
What do you think is your financial score?
