A new survey indicates that PayPal (NASDAQ: PYPL) leads UK digital wealth manager platforms with high consumer awareness of 84%. According to the survey by Opinium and AltFi’s Digital Wealth, about 49% of the respondents have active PayPal accounts.
In contrast, the researchers noted that fintech wealth manager awareness among UK adults is largely low. In a sample size of 2,000 people, digital wealth manager Hargreaves Lansdown had a consumer awareness rate of 33%.
Online investment management platform Nutmeg emerged third with consumer awareness of 30%. Moneybox emerged fourth with an awareness of 23%, followed by Freetrade with 11%. Other brands like Wealthify and Money Dashboard followed with an awareness of 7% each while Wealthsimple had a consumer awareness rate of only 5%.
Picks for you
The survey report acknowledged that fintech platforms and UK challenger banks like Monzo and Starling had done tremendous work, but there is still more to do in raising awareness among UK adults.
Furthermore, the research added that Nutmeg ranked in the fourth position when it comes to respondents with accounts. Among the 2,000 surveyed people, Moneybox was the most used digital wealth platform.
Trust contributing to low fintech awareness
Commenting on the findings, Wealthsimple Europe CEO Caroline Murphree highlighted some of the challenges encountered in getting high consumer awareness for fintech platforms. According to Murphree:
“Companies that are focussed on long-term passive investment would probably agree that, as businesses, we’ve started in the hardest place. How do we get someone to trust us with their life savings, particularly when we’re a new technology company and not a 200-year-old institution? Trust takes time to build, but once you have that trust it opens up many possibilities to be more relevant to our clients.”
The research added that fintech firms were more popular among young people due to their tech-savvy nature.
In general, lack of knowledge and trust in digital wealth managers is the main reason behind the low brand awareness.