No of millionaires to soar by over 50% by 2022: Report

Mumbai: Even though personal wealth has been increasing in the country, there's a considerable wealth poverty with as many as 92 percent of the adult population having a networth below USD 10,000, and just 0.5 percent of them having a networth over USD 1,00,000.

But the country will see rapid growth in wealth, adding USD 2.1 trillion by 2022, an increase of 42 percent over the present level of USD close to USD 5 trillion.

"Total wealth here has risen fourfold between 2000 and 2017, reaching USD 5 trillion in mid-2017. Despite this and having four times the population of the US, India's total wealth is comparable to the level for the US 90 years ago.

"But we expect this to reach USD 6 trillion in real terms by 2022, which is comparable with the level in the US in 1936," Swiss brokerage Credit Suisse said a report.

The report further said the country would have 3,70,000 millionaires in 2022, up from 2,45,000 now, an increase of over 50 percent.

India saw a 9.9 percent increase in household wealth to USD 4.987 trillion, although its addition to total global wealth was just USD 451 billion in mid-2017. The aggregate global wealth rose by USD 16.7 trillion to USD 280 trillion, up 6.4 percent.

The report notes that the country has 3,40,000 adults in the top 1 percent of global wealth holders, which is a 0.7 percent share. Of them 1,820 have a networth of over USD 50 million, and 760 have over USD 100 million.

The report finds share of wealth fails to match the population share as the population share exceeds the wealth share by a factor of almost 10 in the country. The average wealth per adult here is estimated at USD 5,980 in mid-2017.

It noted that personal wealth is dominated by property and other real assets, which make up 86 percent of estimated household assets, while personal debt is estimated to be USD 376, or 9 percent of gross assets, even when adjustments are made for under-reporting.

"But the overall household debt in the country as a proportion of assets is lower than in most of the developed countries," it said.