Three out of four have confidence in pension investments, survey says

THREE out of four adults believe now is a good time to invest in a pension according to the results of a survey released yesterday.

The survey, conducted by Standard Life, gauges the confidence of 1,000 adults in the performance of shares and pensions in the current climate of market uncertainty.

After recent events on international stock markets it is unsurprising that confidence in shares has dropped with 46% of respondents feeling that now is a bad time to invest in shares, compared to a figure of 22% in June of this year.

However, despite the fall off in confidence in market shares, the survey reports a high popularity rating for pensions with 77% of adults surveyed believing now is a good time to invest in a pension and 67% confident that now is a good time to invest in pension top-ups or additional voluntary contributions.

The survey also shows that confidence in the buy-to-let sector in Ireland has fallen by 2% to 40% since the last survey in June 2007.

Just 27% of those who took the survey felt that now is a good time to invest in a managed or equity-based fund, down from 42% three months ago.

Brendan Barr of Standard Life was unsurprised by the findings. He said: “It’s noteworthy that the recent fall in stock market confidence had very little impact on the appeal for pensions, despite the fact that pensions invest predominately in shares. This indicates that people understand the long term benefit of equity investment, as well as the generous tax relief available on pension contributions” said Mr Barr.