Survey finds investment gaps among Finnish teenagers

A survey of teenagers has found differences in investing by gender and parental education, with boys and children of university-educated parents more likely to have investments. Yle reports that 27 percent of respondents aged 14 to 19 said they owned investments.

The survey was part of the 2026 Youth Future Report, produced by the Youth Entrepreneurship and Economy NYT Association with LähiTapiola. Taloustutkimus collected and analysed the data from 6,435 students in lower and upper secondary schools in spring 2026. The reported margin of error for overall results is about 1.3 percentage points.

Among respondents whose parents had university education, 42 percent said they had investments. The figure was 16 percent among those whose parents had completed vocational qualifications.

There was also a difference between boys and girls: about one in three boys said they had investments, compared with one in four girls. NYT Association chief executive Johanna Vesikallio said the gap was concerning because it could also affect the accumulation of wealth.

Young people most commonly said they got information about investing from parents and relatives. Social media video platforms, including YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, were the second-most common source, with social media more prominent among boys. About half said they received investment information at home, Vesikallio said. Two thirds of respondents wanted to learn about investing at school.

Seventeen-year-old Matias Kanervo began investing at 14, after looking into past returns from funds and discussing the subject with his parents. He started with small sums saved from work, choosing funds because they seemed simpler than researching individual shares. When he had saved a few hundred euros, he invested the money with his parents. He now earns money as a hockey referee and through casual jobs.

Kanervo said he saves for investments by avoiding unnecessary purchases and eating school meals rather than buying food elsewhere. He can follow the performance of his investments but cannot yet manage all of them independently. He will gain control of them when he turns 18.

Minors need help from guardians to invest, but the arrangements vary. Kanervo said one provider required both parents to attend in person, which was difficult to coordinate with work and school schedules. He eventually opened investments through another provider. Among young people who owned investments, 42 percent said a parent managed them, while 34 percent said they managed them together with a parent.

The Youth Future Report had not previously measured young people’s investments. Statistics Finland data show that in 2025 about 23 percent of people under 18 owned investment funds and just under 6 percent owned listed shares. The figures are not directly comparable with the survey, which covered 14-to-19-year-olds and did not separate investment types.