Stockholding: Participation, Location, and Spillovers

Abstract

This paper provides the first joint analysis of household stockholding participation, location among stockholding modes, and participation spillovers. Our model matches observed participation, conditional and unconditional, and asset location patterns. We find that financial sophistication correlates strongly only with direct stockholding and mutual fund participation, while social interactions mainly influence stockholding through retirement accounts. Whether retirement account owners include7 stocks in them strongly depends on owner characteristics, unlike with mutual fund owners and investment in stock funds. Stockholding is more common among retirement account owners, but mainly because of owner characteristics rather than spillovers from retirement account ownership.