Global Financial Wellness Survey

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• Defining Financial Wellness
• Understanding Fidelity’s Financial Wellness Score
• Financial Wellness across the globe
• See Financial Wellness in action
• Read the global report

To better understand financial wellness of people around the world, our comprehensive survey posed financial and behavioural questions to working households in the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, China, Hong Kong* and Canada.

We believe financial wellness is holistic and multi-layered and our survey assessed objective and subjective inputs across four key domains: Budgeting, Debt, Savings and Protection.

The Fidelity Financial Wellness Score uses a consistent analytical framework across the regions while using modelling assumptions that are appropriate for each region. The Score combines objective criteria – such as their level of savings and how they manage expenses – with subjective criteria, such as how they feel about their finances.

How is the score calculated?

Each domain contributes a maximum of 25 points to the overall maximum score of 100. This scoring approach affords great flexibility in breaking down the Fidelity Financial Wellness Score in ways that provide deep insights into personal financial well-being.

The sum of all four domains yields a total score that can range from 0 to 100, where 0 represents extreme financial distress and 100 indicates the maximum level of financial wellness.

The total score is categorised into one of four discrete levels of financial wellness: 

• Excellent (80–100)
• Good (60–79)
• Fair (40-59)
• Needs Attention (0–39)

Objective vs subjective financial wellness

Financial wellness is not just about the objective monetary picture, it is also a function of the subjective picture with respect to how people feel about their finances. Understanding the subjective and objective side of financial wellness is key to communicating effectively with employees about their finances.

In the chart below we examine employee support needs based on objective versus subjective financial wellness:

• High Objective/High Subjective - The ideal state where the respondent’s financial wellness is objectively good, and they also feel good about their position.
• High Objective/Low Subjective - A ‘reality check’ opportunity where the respondent needs a confidence boost.
• Low Objective/High Subjective - Also a ‘reality check’ opportunity where the respondent needs a wakeup call.
• Low Objective/Low Subjective - Respondents in this category need comprehensive support.

Across the six regions surveyed in 2020 – the United Kingdom, Germany, China, Hong Kong, Japan and Canada -- the median Financial Wellness Scores fell mostly in the ‘Good’ range with China at the top end with a median score of 71 and the United Kingdom at the lower end, returning a median score of 63 which places the region at the lower end of the ‘Good’ category.

It is worth noting, that while the median scores are classified as ‘Good’ across the regions, the range within the ‘Good’ category is reasonably wide (from 60 to 79). So, even those that may score at the top of this range still have significant opportunities for improvement.

Source: Fidelity Global Financial Wellness Survey, 2020. All Financial Wellness Scores are median scores. The sum of all four domains yields a total score that can range from 0 to 100, where 0 represents extreme financial distress and 100 indicates the maximum level of financial wellness. The total score is categorised into one of four discrete levels of financial wellness: Excellent (80-100), Good (60-79), Fair (40-59) and Needs Attention (0-39).

*The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR), as a part of China, is referred to as Hong Kong (HK) in this report.