The Covid-19 pandemic has been difficult for many families and households. According to a study conducted by Generali, an Italy-based global insurance and asset management company, about 80% of the working class in India has experienced loss of income during the pandemic and over 90% of them are preparing for more challenges in the future.
The 2019 Global Family Business Survey by STEP and KPMG reveals that 18% of family business leaders globally are women. It is said that the role women play traditionally, of nurturing the family and maintaining the household, make them holistic leaders with unique management skills. Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, many women decided to step-up even more, exploring alternative ways to earn and started new businesses from their homes to provide financial support to their families during these challenging times.
If you’re looking to save your monthly income and allocate budgets for separate needs, homemakers are the best ambassadors to look up to. In the last six months, India has witnessed a dearth in regular supplies, mounting job losses, and sky-rocketing living costs. In such times, homemakers turned to some key financial instruments to rise above the setback.
With a long-term vision in mind, many of them trusted to invest their lifelong savings in fixed deposits especially the ones offered by latest online neo-banking platforms. One of the most compelling reason is the guaranteed returns that these products offers. Additionally, women who parked their money in such FDs leveraged the flexibility that it provided to withdraw money before its maturity. This proves to be a major benefit as it allows easy flow of cash when households experience liquidity crunch.
To augment the size of their wealth bundles, many homemakers tapped the lucrative offerings of mutual funds before the lockdown. While the markets experienced sluggish growth in the first 6 months, the economy unlocking has reinforced market sentiments, resulting in profitable portfolios. Understanding the hassle-freeness of allocating money via systematic investment plans (SIPs) and choosing the right platforms that facilitate each step while ensuring that the process is completely contactless has helped home makers become cash mangers of the household.
As we all know, women are the smartest gold-investors. The low-risk, high-return portfolio of this investment offers a faster and safer way to make investments especially at a time of market volatility. Homemakers preferred to choose online options for this investment as it bestowed convenience considering that they have to juggle with the rising volume of household duties.
Research from Warwick Business School boasts about women’s portfolio, which has outperformed men’s by 1.8 percentage points. The terrific combination of women’s intellectual and skills applied to investment opportunities such as FD, MF, and Gold via digitally suitable apps has a promising path of development.
SIDDHARTH MEHTA
CEO, Freecharge
