NEW SURVEY: 30-44 Year Olds Most Likely To Invest Online

NEW YORK, Oct. 8, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, RateWatch, a premier banking data and analytics service owned by TheStreet, Inc. (NASDAQ: TST) released the results from of a new survey: Consumer Investing – How Do Banks and Credit Unions Fit? The data took a look at what types of consumers are investing and where they are placing those investments.

Survey highlights include:

• 32% of those that currently utilize a financial advisor at a bank or credit union also utilize a financial advisor at an investment firm and/or online.
• Those 18-29 years old are least likely to invest with an investment advisor at a firm and are most likely not to invest at all.
• Those ages 30-44 are more likely to invest online than any other age group.
• Women are significantly more likely than men to prefer full guidance in their investing decisions (42% vs 28%). Men are also more likely than women to make decisions on their own (28% vs 19%).
• Overall, those with an income of less than $25,000 are more likely to purchase homeowners insurance and auto insurance from a bank/credit than any other income group.
• Those that have a graduate degree are least likely to purchase identity theft protection from a bank or credit union compared with those of other levels of education.
• More than 20% of those with incomes of more than $100,000 said they do not know what exchange traded funds (ETFs) are and about 47% say they have no interest in learning more about them. By contrast, only about 8% of respondents in those same income groups said they do not know what Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) are.

"It's surprising to see what types of investment products people with higher annual incomes are knowledgeable about," said Dan Freed, Senior Staff Writer for TheStreet. "Exchange-traded funds are arguably the cheapest, simplest and safest way to invest in the stock market, but many people—including people with money to invest—don't know what they are or aren't interested in learning more about them."

For more about this survey, please visit https://www.rate-watch.com/pdf/survey-results/consumer-investing-survey-preview-2014.pdf.

For the full story from TheStreet, please visit http://www.thestreet.com/story/12901336/1/many-well-off-people-dont-know-what-exchange-traded-funds-are.html.

Survey Methodology
Survey responses were obtained through a third party service with questions distributed July 23 to August 12, 2014 to consumers ages 18 and older throughout the United States. 864 total unique responses were received with 710 having completed the full survey.

About RateWatch
For over 20 years, RateWatch has been the premier provider of competitive interest rate and product information to financial institutions across the United States.  Consistently providing top quality, highly relevant data RateWatch maintains the largest database in the industry with deposit, loan, and fee information monitoring over 97,000 locations. Rate surveys, product comparisons, financial strength reporting, local/regional/national averages, fee reporting, specialty reports and more are available.  To learn more about RateWatch, visit www.rate-watch.com.  RateWatch is a division of TheStreet, Inc.

About TheStreet
TheStreet, Inc. is the leading independent digital financial media company providing business and financial news, investing ideas and analysis to personal and institutional investors worldwide. The Company's portfolio of business and personal finance brands includes: TheStreet, RealMoney, RealMoney Pro, Stockpickr, Action Alerts PLUS, Options Profits, MainStreet and RateWatch. To learn more, visit www.thestreet.com. The Deal, the Company's institutional business, provides intraday coverage of mergers and acquisitions and all other changes in corporate control. To learn more, visit www.thedeal.com.

CONTACT:
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SOURCE TheStreet, Inc.