Special Report on Investments and Personal Finance : When Will Mutual Funds Recognize Yuppies?
We all know that investing in mutual funds is a great way to invest a little bit of money across a spectrum of asset classes to achieve good returns with a minimum of investment risk--and have it all managed by experts whom you normally could never afford.
Or do we?
There are very few mutual fund companies that have strived to educate younger professionals on these very simple fundamentals of mutual fund investing. The marketing has been focused on the easy sale--people who have been stockpiling their financial war chest in bank CDs and money market funds for the past 20 years.
The message, for the most part, is loud and clear: Investing is for older people who have a lot of money.
The yuppies who watched MTV change their culture during their college years are a virtually untapped market for mutual funds. They don’t even know they’re untapped. They don’t know about low minimum investments and automatic investment plans. This demographic group is like an undervalued stock: It will reach its full potential in five or 10 years, whereas the group targeted by the fund industry will be redeeming at an alarming rate during the same time frame.
What’s needed? Exposure. Education. Alerting young investors to the fact that a lot of expert portfolio managers are the same age as they are.
Young portfolio managers are a good selling point for younger investors, who are going to believe in the professional manager’s competence and ability as much as they believe in their own. (They are less of a selling point for the 60-plus investor who has a hard time trusting his assets to a young whippersnapper.)
This market is not “Generation X,” and it’s not the baby boomers. The yuppies were raised on Steely Dan and the Bee Gees. Other industries are cashing in on these high wage earners; check out the latest ad campaigns for Reebok and Revlon--and McDonald’s effective spend-quality-time-with-your-children commercials. Likewise, what makes the new Saturn so unique? Targeted marketing to those who want to spend their good incomes wisely.
Mutual funds are a gold mine for the ambitious 22-year-old who wants to own his own business in 10 years without having to sell Amway products on the side. People are marrying younger these days, which gives them a longer time to pool their dual salaries and invest toward buying a house. Couples are having children later, opting to buy all their expensive toys first when in another generation they would have been investing for an Ivy League education. Some people, particularly women, are choosing not to marry at all. What do you think these women executives are doing with their $40,000-plus salaries?
Mutual fund companies are letting the younger set twist in the wind during their most productive years, relying on their in-laws to set them straight about how much college will cost in the year 2010.
Some enterprising--probably young--mutual fund executive is going to revolutionize the investing industry by introducing it to the 25-to-40 demographic. Let’s hope it happens before they start reeling in the years.
