Number of Brazil individual investors in equities more than doubles, says B3
SAO PAULO, Nov 25 (Reuters) - The number of individual investors trading on Brazil's stock exchange operator B3 SA more than doubled in October from a year earlier, the company said in a securities filing late on Tuesday.
The avalanche of new investors come as Brazil's benchmark interest rates are at record low levels, fuelling investors' appetite for higher potential returns from equities. Still, the benchmark stock index is down 5% this year.
B3 ended October with 3.2 million individual investors, up 106.9% year-over-year and 2.6% from the previous month, a record level.
Trading volumes soared 71.8% in October year-on-year to 27.6 billion reais, and 1.3% in a month, B3 added.
Driven by investors' appetite for equities, initial public offerings by Brazilian companies this year rose 133% from the previous year, to $6.4 billion, according to Refinitiv, with 26 companies listing their shares. (Reporting by Paula Laier, writing by Carolina Mandl)
