After saving and investing, Indians like to use their spare cash to buy new technology products. Paying off debts and credit card loans has gone down in importance and house maintenance, new clothes, holidays and vacations have replaced it.
After clearing off debts, 25% Indians would put their spare cash into retirement fund and nearly 20% would spend on out-of-home entertainment, according to the latest Nielsen Global Consumer Confidence survey.
Increasing food prices is the biggest concern for Indians in the fourth quarter of 2009. In India, where food accounts for 58% of household expenditure compared with only 10-15% in the wealthiest western countries, rising food prices is becoming a major concern and affecting Indian consumers? spending power. Job security has again become an issue which follows increasing food prices in the list of concerns. Work life balance stands third on the list with 12% Indians worrying over it. In the last round, work life balance was the biggest concern for Indians with 15% votes.
?In the third quarter of 2009 consumers had started believing that the worst was over, but runaway food prices and high grocery bills have put the cautious optimism back in them. They are still worried about the time it will take for things to get better. Until the consumers are reassured that recovery is going to accelerate and they can finally call economic slowdown a thing of the past, they are going to be cautious,? said Vatsala Pant, director, client solutions, The Nielsen Company.
On the back of the Copenhagen summit, Indian concern over global warming has gone up by 3% to 10% and their concern over the economy has gone down to 9% from 12% in third quarter. Other concerns bothering Indians are terrorism and children?s education and/or welfare, health and parent?s welfare and happiness, debt and increasing utility bills, political stability and increasing fuel prices, war, crime, tolerance towards various religions, and tolerance towards other countries? values.
The survey finds Indian consumers are cautious over their discretionary spending. After meeting the necessary living expenses Indians put their spare cash into savings. This has been the favourite mode of spare cash utilisation for Indians for some time now and in the latest round of the survey has become dearer to Indians by 1%. In the latest round of the survey, Indians have become more watchful of investing in the stock market. The percentage of Indians who will put their spare cash into shares of stock and mutual funds has gone down by 4% to 40% compared with the last round of the survey.
However, in the last quarter of 2009, Indian consumers have become more conscious of a full economic recovery in a year. Nearly half of the Indian consumers think that the country is in an economic recession at the moment. 58% of these said that India will be out of economic recession in the next twelve months.