I have been wondering for some time what would happen at the next big market crash, particularly in relation to new investors enticed into stocks and shares ISAs by low interest rates on savings and the availability of DIY platforms. These novice investors will have experienced good times over the past decade with rising markets.

Boom. The impact of Covid-19 wiped billions off the value of markets across the globe. The FTSE 100 index fell from just above 7400 on 21st February to just below 5000 on 23rd March.

In partnership with This Is Money, we looked at the impact of Covid-19 on investor sentiment. Below are some of the key findings from our research:

• 58% are concerned about the impact of Covid-19 on their investments
• 40% never expected that stock markets could fall so much
• 32% feel their investment provider/adviser has given good levels of support, although 20% disagree
• 18% regret investing as much as they have done. Those who have started investing in the past 10 years are almost three times as likely to agree with this than more experienced investors (24% vs 9%). The percentage rises to 41% amongst new investors who use DIY platforms.
• 16% have sold a significant amount of their investments since Covid-19 started having an impact. Again, newer investors are much more likely than experienced investors to agree (21% v 6%), with 38% of new investors who use platforms agreeing.
• 35% will be more inclined to use a financial adviser in the future. This rises to 42% amongst those who started investing in the past 10 years and 46% amongst 18-34s.
• 25% feel less likely to invest in the future, rising to 36% of those who started investing in the past 10 years and use platforms.

N.B. Percentages shown are the net of agree/strongly agree.

The value of your investments can go up as well as down. Investors are regularly reminded of this fact, but recent falls will have been a real wake-up call for less experienced investors. While 60% of investors are confident markets will rebound, time will tell if Covid-19 will lead to a move back towards more advised services, but with digital, hybrid services that seamlessly integrate DIY investing tools and personalised advice benefitting.

You can read the resulting article from This Is Money

Please do contact us if you are interested in conducting similar research or would like to discuss our findings in more detail.

We surveyed 650 UK investors on 1st-2nd April 2020 using Harris 24.