IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jconsa/v55y2021i4p1464-1488.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Financial literacy and household asset allocation: Evidence from micro‐data in China

Author

Listed:
  • Xiaomeng Lu
  • Jingna Xiao
  • Yu Wu

Abstract

Improving household asset allocation (HAA) ability can enable households to increase consumption and promote the steady growth of China's economy. However, HAA decisions in China are suboptimal. This may be related to households' limited financial literacy. Based on 2017 and 2019 China Household Finance Survey data, this study examines the role of financial literacy in improving HAA. It finds that the higher the household's financial literacy, the higher the household's score in the asset allocation evaluation because households with higher financial literacy pay greater attention to economic and financial news and are more inclined to seek advice from investment advisors. Further analysis shows that the optimization effect of financial literacy on HAA is greater in households that are wealthy, higher educated, and located in areas with better regional financial development. In conclusion, helping households improve their financial literacy is an important step toward improving HAA ability.

Suggested Citation

  • Xiaomeng Lu & Jingna Xiao & Yu Wu, 2021. "Financial literacy and household asset allocation: Evidence from micro‐data in China," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(4), pages 1464-1488, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jconsa:v:55:y:2021:i:4:p:1464-1488
    DOI: 10.1111/joca.12406
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/joca.12406
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/joca.12406?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Luigi Guiso & Tullio Jappelli, 2008. "Financial Literacy and Portfolio Diversification," EIEF Working Papers Series 0812, Einaudi Institute for Economics and Finance (EIEF), revised Oct 2008.
    2. Du, Zaichao & Zhang, Lin, 2015. "Home-purchase restriction, property tax and housing price in China: A counterfactual analysis," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 188(2), pages 558-568.
    3. Shapira, Zur & Venezia, Itzhak, 2001. "Patterns of behavior of professionally managed and independent investors," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(8), pages 1573-1587, August.
    4. Hans-Martin Von Gaudecker, 2015. "How Does Household Portfolio Diversification Vary with Financial Literacy and Financial Advice?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(2), pages 489-507, April.
    5. Annamaria Lusardi & Pierre-Carl Michaud & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2017. "Optimal Financial Knowledge and Wealth Inequality," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(2), pages 431-477.
    6. Jappelli, Tullio & Padula, Mario, 2013. "Investment in financial literacy and saving decisions," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 2779-2792.
    7. Milo Bianchi, 2018. "Financial Literacy and Portfolio Dynamics," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 73(2), pages 831-859, April.
    8. Zhou, Weina, 2014. "Brothers, household financial markets and savings rate in China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 34-47.
    9. David A. Love, 2013. "Optimal Rules of Thumb for Consumption and Portfolio Choice," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 123, pages 932-961, September.
    10. Francisco J. Gomes & Laurence J. Kotlikoff & Luis M. Viceira, 2008. "Optimal Life-Cycle Investing with Flexible Labor Supply: A Welfare Analysis of Life-Cycle Funds," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(2), pages 297-303, May.
    11. Annamarie Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2005. "Financial Literacy and Planning: Implications for Retirement Wellbeing," Working Papers wp108, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    12. Gathergood, John & Weber, Jörg, 2017. "Financial literacy, present bias and alternative mortgage products," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 58-83.
    13. Bernheim, B. Douglas & Garrett, Daniel M., 2003. "The effects of financial education in the workplace: evidence from a survey of households," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(7-8), pages 1487-1519, August.
    14. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia Mitchell, 2007. "Financial Literacy and Retirement Planning: New Evidence from the Rand American Life Panel," Working Papers wp157, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    15. Yvonne Jie Chen & Zhiwu Chen & Shijun He, 2019. "Social Norms and Household Savings Rates in China," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 23(5), pages 961-991.
    16. Lu, Xiaomeng & Zhang, Yong & Zhang, Yixing & Wang, Lin, 2020. "Can investment advisors promote rational investment? Evidence from micro-data in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 251-263.
    17. Disney, Richard & Gathergood, John, 2013. "Financial literacy and consumer credit portfolios," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(7), pages 2246-2254.
    18. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2017. "How Ordinary Consumers Make Complex Economic Decisions: Financial Literacy and Retirement Readiness," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 7(03), pages 1-31, September.
    19. David A. Love, 2010. "The Effects of Marital Status and Children on Savings and Portfolio Choice," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(1), pages 385-432, January.
    20. Harjoat S. Bhamra & Raman Uppal, 2019. "Does Household Finance Matter? Small Financial Errors with Large Social Costs," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(3), pages 1116-1154, March.
    21. Li Liao & Jing Jian Xiao & Weiqiang Zhang & Congyi Zhou, 2017. "Financial literacy and risky asset holdings: evidence from China," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 57(5), pages 1383-1415, December.
    22. Pelizzon, Loriana & Weber, Guglielmo, 2008. "Are Household Portfolios Efficient? an Analysis Conditional on Housing," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(2), pages 401-431, June.
    23. Patrick Honohan, 2006. "Household Financial Assets in the Process of Development," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2006-91, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    24. Joao F. Cocco, 2005. "Portfolio Choice in the Presence of Housing," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(2), pages 535-567.
    25. Ruben Cox & Dirk Brounen & Peter Neuteboom, 2015. "Financial Literacy, Risk Aversion and Choice of Mortgage Type by Households," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 50(1), pages 74-112, January.
    26. Beck, Thorsten & Demirguc-Kunt, Asli & Martinez Peria, Maria Soledad, 2007. "Reaching out: Access to and use of banking services across countries," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 234-266, July.
    27. Roman Inderst & Marco Ottaviani, 2012. "Competition through Commissions and Kickbacks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(2), pages 780-809, April.
    28. Aussi Sayinzoga & Erwin H. Bulte & Robert Lensink, 2016. "Financial Literacy and Financial Behaviour: Experimental Evidence from Rural Rwanda," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(594), pages 1571-1599, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Preston, Alison & Qiu, Lili & Wright, Robert E., 2022. "A Study of the Chinese Gender Gap in Financial Literacy," IZA Discussion Papers 15253, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Yan Liu & Quaner Wen & Abbas Ali Chandio & Long Chen & Lu Gan, 2022. "Investment Risk Analysis for Green and Sustainable Planning of Rural Family: A Case Study of Tibetan Region," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-19, September.
    3. Abu Elnasr E. Sobaih & Ibrahim A. Elshaer, 2023. "Risk-Taking, Financial Knowledge, and Risky Investment Intention: Expanding Theory of Planned Behavior Using a Moderating-Mediating Model," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-17, January.
    4. Trang M. T. Phung & Quoc N. Tran & Phuong Nguyen‐Hoang & Nhut H. Nguyen & Tho H. Nguyen, 2023. "The role of learning motivation on financial knowledge among Vietnamese college students," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(1), pages 529-563, January.
    5. Xiao Ling & Luanfeng Wang & Yuxi Pan & Yanchao Feng, 2023. "The Impact of Financial Literacy on Household Health Investment: Empirical Evidence from China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(3), pages 1-23, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Azra Zaimovic & Anes Torlakovic & Almira Arnaut-Berilo & Tarik Zaimovic & Lejla Dedovic & Minela Nuhic Meskovic, 2023. "Mapping Financial Literacy: A Systematic Literature Review of Determinants and Recent Trends," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-30, June.
    2. Xiaomeng Lu & Jiaojiao Guo & Hailing Zhou, 2021. "Digital financial inclusion development, investment diversification, and household extreme portfolio risk," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 61(5), pages 6225-6261, December.
    3. Marco Nieddu & Lorenzo Pandolfi, 2018. "Cutting Through the Fog: Financial Literacy and the Subjective Value of Financial Assets," CSEF Working Papers 497, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    4. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.
    5. Wei, Li & Peng, Ming & Wu, Weixing, 2021. "Financial literacy and fraud detection——Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 478-494.
    6. Oscar A. Stolper & Andreas Walter, 2017. "Financial literacy, financial advice, and financial behavior," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 87(5), pages 581-643, July.
    7. Susanna Levantesi & Giulia Zacchia, 2021. "Machine Learning and Financial Literacy: An Exploration of Factors Influencing Financial Knowledge in Italy," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-21, March.
    8. Li, Xiao, 2020. "When financial literacy meets textual analysis: A conceptual review," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    9. Bose, Udichibarna & MacDonald, Ronald & Tsoukas, Serafeim, 2015. "Education and the local equity bias around the world," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 65-88.
    10. Anoosheh Rostamkalaei & Allan Riding, 2020. "Immigrants, Financial Knowledge, and Financial Behavior," Journal of Consumer Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(3), pages 951-977, September.
    11. Annamaria Lusardi & Olivia S. Mitchell, 2014. "The Economic Importance of Financial Literacy: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(1), pages 5-44, March.
    12. Kramer, Marc M., 2016. "Financial literacy, confidence and financial advice seeking," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 198-217.
    13. Hiroshi Fujiki, 2019. "Who needs guidance from a financial adviser? Evidence from Japan," Working Papers on Central Bank Communication 011, University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Economics.
    14. Shin, Su Hyun & Kim, Kyoung Tae & Seay, Martin, 2020. "Sources of information and portfolio allocation," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    15. Sholevar, Maryam & Harris, Laurence, 2019. "Mind the gap: A discussion paper on Financial Literacy, Financial behaviour and Financial Education : Is there any Gender Gap?," OSF Preprints b7zd6, Center for Open Science.
    16. Christian Königsheim & Moritz Lukas & Markus Nöth, 2017. "Financial Knowledge, Risk Preferences, and the Demand for Digital Financial Services," Schmalenbach Business Review, Springer;Schmalenbach-Gesellschaft, vol. 18(4), pages 343-375, October.
    17. Love, David & Phelan, Gregory, 2015. "Hyperbolic discounting and life-cycle portfolio choice," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(4), pages 492-524, October.
    18. Korkmaz, Aslihan Gizem & Yin, Zhichao & Yue, Pengpeng & Zhou, Haigang, 2021. "Does financial literacy alleviate risk attitude and risk behavior inconsistency?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 293-310.
    19. Entorf, Horst & Hou, Jia, 2018. "Financial education for the disadvantaged? A review," SAFE Working Paper Series 205, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    20. Elisabeth Beckmann & Christa Hainz & Sarah Reiter, 2022. "Third-Party Loan Guarantees: Measuring Literacy and its Effect on Financial Decisions (Elisabeth Beckmann, Christa Hainz, Sarah Reiter)," Working Papers 237, Oesterreichische Nationalbank (Austrian Central Bank).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jconsa:v:55:y:2021:i:4:p:1464-1488. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0022-0078 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.