KiwiSaver investors look offshore

New Zealand investors have often had a home bias, but as the local share market has underperformed over the past five years, KiwiSaver and investment managers say the focus has increasingly turned international.

Sharesies said earlier this month that 80% of its trading volumes were now on US markets. It credited the introduction of the US500 fund with driving an increase of switches into its KiwiSaver.

Kernel said it too was seeing a big shift towards global exposure. Its Global 100 fund has more than doubled in size over the past year, from $346.8 million to $724.1 million, while its High Growth Fund which provides broad international equity exposure grew 122%.

It said about 78% of all assets on its platform had global exposure.