Retail asset ownership patterns reveal much more than just product penetration. A large allocation to real assets such as gold and real estate points to a lack of reach and/or a lack of trust in financial products. A robust survey is a good place to look at and analyse asset ownership patterns. Over the next few months, Mint Money will showcase results of the Indian Financial Scape survey conducted by Delhi-based economics research firm Indicus Analytics to look at patterns of financial asset ownership. Starting today, over the next nine weeks, we will look at the financial products urban India owns. 

The data is broken across income groups and regional patterns. Over 35,000 households were surveyed across urban India in April-June 2012. By the end of nine weeks, we hope to get a strong grip on what drives financial asset ownership in urban India. This week we find that Indians living in western India are more heavily banked than their cousins in the east. We also find, not surprisingly, that as income levels rise, the percentage of banked Indian rises dramatically—90% of those earning more than Rs. 5 lakh a year use savings deposits. This number is at least 95% for income levels higher than Rs. 10 lakh a year.

Key takeaways

•As income of a household increases, bank account ownership also rises.

•Overall, the households in the western region of the country own more bank accounts compared with other regions.

 Also See | Urban India Loves Its Savings Bank Accounts (PDF)