This paper presents a survey on a sample of online investors in a virtual community in Italy. The survey aims to understand what this new type of investor is like – subjects studied range from occasional to independent and semi-professional investors – and it examines the implications emanating from their online exposure. By looking at motivation, risk propensity, education and online experience, we found that knowledge sharing and learning in virtual communities cannot compensate for the financial education-gap of these investors. Secondly, results showed that online exposure tends to increase investors’ propensity for risk, which in turn does not guarantee better portfolio performance. Only a robust education level and more trading experience were found to promote good portfolio performance, and help investors to keep risk under control. Our results cast serious doubts about the mantra of online knowledge generation, and calls for urgent initiatives to improve the financial literacy of online investors.

Back to Basics! The Educational Gap of Online Investors and the Conundrum of Virtual Communities

CASARIN, Roberto;
2015-01-01

Abstract

This paper presents a survey on a sample of online investors in a virtual community in Italy. The survey aims to understand what this new type of investor is like – subjects studied range from occasional to independent and semi-professional investors – and it examines the implications emanating from their online exposure. By looking at motivation, risk propensity, education and online experience, we found that knowledge sharing and learning in virtual communities cannot compensate for the financial education-gap of these investors. Secondly, results showed that online exposure tends to increase investors’ propensity for risk, which in turn does not guarantee better portfolio performance. Only a robust education level and more trading experience were found to promote good portfolio performance, and help investors to keep risk under control. Our results cast serious doubts about the mantra of online knowledge generation, and calls for urgent initiatives to improve the financial literacy of online investors.
File in questo prodotto:
File Dimensione Formato  
BackToBas.pdf

non disponibili

Descrizione: backbas
Tipologia: Versione dell'editore
Licenza: Accesso chiuso-personale
Dimensione 314.8 kB
Formato Adobe PDF
314.8 kB Adobe PDF   Visualizza/Apri

I documenti in ARCA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.

Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/10278/3661698
Citazioni
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.pmc??? ND
  • Scopus ND
  • ???jsp.display-item.citation.isi??? ND
social impact