The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) indicated that private financial wealth in the Middle East region reached $3.8 trillion at the end of 2017, constituting an increase of 11% from $3.4 trillion at end-2016. It noted that the region's private financial wealth grew by a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.8% between 2012 and 2017. It said that the region's private wealth accounted for 1.9% of global private financial wealth in 2017, higher than the share of Eastern Europe & Central Asia (1.6%) and Africa (0.8%), but lower than the share of North America (42.6%), Western Europe (22.4%), Asia-Pacific excluding Japan (18.1%), Japan (8.3%), Oceania (2.2%) and Latin America (2%). Further, it noted that 82% of the Middle East region's private wealth in 2017 was held in investable assets such as cash and deposits, equity, bonds and investment funds; while 18% was invested in non-investable assets such as life insurance, pensions and unlisted equities. In parallel, BCG estimated the private financial wealth per capita in the Middle East region at $18,000 in 2017, ranging from less than $6,000 per capita in Iran and Iraq to more than $400,000 per capita in Qatar. The region's private wealth per capita was higher than in Asia-Pacific excluding Japan ($13,000), Eastern Europe & Central Asia ($12,000), Latin America ($11,000) and Africa ($3,000), while it was lower than that in North America ($312,000), Japan and Oceania ($179,000) and Western Europe ($142,000). It forecast the Middle East region's private wealth per capita to increase to about $25,000 by 2022.
Source: Boston Consulting Group