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My dad sent me an article from Canoe Financial over the weekend that included the chart below. What it shows is that corporate equities and mutual fund shares now make up a greater percentage of household wealth in the US than residential real estate for only the second time since 1990.
From a macro perspective, and when you consider the popularity of index funds, this means that American households probably have a lot of their wealth concentrated in high-growth tech stocks. And since these stocks are being driven higher largely due to the promise of AI, there's perhaps a concentration risk for US households.
The other thing this chart made me wonder about was what it would look like for Canadian households.
According to these net worth indicators released by Statistics Canada in October 2025, real estate as a share of total household assets was sitting at 41.8%. Financial assets as a share of total assets were at 53.4%, but this includes life insurance and pensions, which are not included in the US chart.
If we remove this line item, we're left with "other financial assets" at 37.8%. However, this account also includes cash deposits, bonds, foreign investments, and other receivables, which I also don't think are carried in the US chart. So net-net, Canadian household wealth is composed of real estate at 41.8% and corporate equities at some number below 37.8%.
Real estate is the larger net worth account for Canadian households. Whether this is good or bad is a topic for another post, but there's certainly an argument to be made that Canadians are over-indexing on real estate at the expense of investing in new ideas and businesses.
Cover photo by Daniela Araya on Unsplash
Here are some interesting figures from a recent Statistics Canada article about Canada's national net worth.
In the first quarter of this year, Canada's national net worth increased by over $1 trillion or 7.7% to reach nearly $15 trillion. This is, as I understand it, record-breaking. National net worth is defined as the sum of national wealth and Canada's net foreign asset position, the latter of which is assets that Canada owns abroad, minus the value of any domestic assets owned by foreigners. Most of the increase this past quarter was in national wealth.
Here is a chart that speaks to this (quarterly change in national net worth by component). Again, the light blue is national wealth. It is the biggest bar.
My dad sent me an article from Canoe Financial over the weekend that included the chart below. What it shows is that corporate equities and mutual fund shares now make up a greater percentage of household wealth in the US than residential real estate for only the second time since 1990.
From a macro perspective, and when you consider the popularity of index funds, this means that American households probably have a lot of their wealth concentrated in high-growth tech stocks. And since these stocks are being driven higher largely due to the promise of AI, there's perhaps a concentration risk for US households.
The other thing this chart made me wonder about was what it would look like for Canadian households.
According to these net worth indicators released by Statistics Canada in October 2025, real estate as a share of total household assets was sitting at 41.8%. Financial assets as a share of total assets were at 53.4%, but this includes life insurance and pensions, which are not included in the US chart.
If we remove this line item, we're left with "other financial assets" at 37.8%. However, this account also includes cash deposits, bonds, foreign investments, and other receivables, which I also don't think are carried in the US chart. So net-net, Canadian household wealth is composed of real estate at 41.8% and corporate equities at some number below 37.8%.
Real estate is the larger net worth account for Canadian households. Whether this is good or bad is a topic for another post, but there's certainly an argument to be made that Canadians are over-indexing on real estate at the expense of investing in new ideas and businesses.
Cover photo by Daniela Araya on Unsplash
Here are some interesting figures from a recent Statistics Canada article about Canada's national net worth.
In the first quarter of this year, Canada's national net worth increased by over $1 trillion or 7.7% to reach nearly $15 trillion. This is, as I understand it, record-breaking. National net worth is defined as the sum of national wealth and Canada's net foreign asset position, the latter of which is assets that Canada owns abroad, minus the value of any domestic assets owned by foreigners. Most of the increase this past quarter was in national wealth.
Here is a chart that speaks to this (quarterly change in national net worth by component). Again, the light blue is national wealth. It is the biggest bar.
On a per capita basis, which is much easier to contextualize, national net worth rose from $365,184 to $392,496.
The other metric that is up is household savings. We've talked about this before on the blog, but check out this chart. In the first quarter of this year, it was 13.1%. And at the beginning of the pandemic, back in Q2-2020, it was 27.4%. I believe these figures represent the percentage of after-tax disposable income that is saved. Either way, a double digit savings rate is not typical for Canadians.
So what is driving this increase in national wealth? A big part of it is the value of residential real estate, which increased 9.4% in the first quarter. StatsCan is calling this "unprecedented" but I don't know how far back they are looking to make this claim.
Because of this, increases in net worth have been, not surprisingly, unequally felt. For households that own their home, net worth increased by over $730 billion last quarter. For households that rent their home, net worth increased by approximately $43 billion. On a per household basis, this translates into net worth increases of approximately $73,000 and $8,000, respectively.
This is a meaningful spread.
For the full Statistics Canada article, click here.
On a per capita basis, which is much easier to contextualize, national net worth rose from $365,184 to $392,496.
The other metric that is up is household savings. We've talked about this before on the blog, but check out this chart. In the first quarter of this year, it was 13.1%. And at the beginning of the pandemic, back in Q2-2020, it was 27.4%. I believe these figures represent the percentage of after-tax disposable income that is saved. Either way, a double digit savings rate is not typical for Canadians.
So what is driving this increase in national wealth? A big part of it is the value of residential real estate, which increased 9.4% in the first quarter. StatsCan is calling this "unprecedented" but I don't know how far back they are looking to make this claim.
Because of this, increases in net worth have been, not surprisingly, unequally felt. For households that own their home, net worth increased by over $730 billion last quarter. For households that rent their home, net worth increased by approximately $43 billion. On a per household basis, this translates into net worth increases of approximately $73,000 and $8,000, respectively.
This is a meaningful spread.
For the full Statistics Canada article, click here.
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