What SA's own finfluencers reveal about our financial sins

The Economist's survey of celebrity financial gurus skips an instructive case: South Africa. We have no single Ramsey or Lewis — instead a swarm of forex and crypto "finfluencers" promising outsized returns, the same appetite for quick money that fed multi-billion-rand collapses like Mirror Trading International and Africrypt. Genuine voices like Magnus Heystek preach equities and offshore diversification, yet SA households still hold only a sliver of their wealth in shares, favouring property, debt and get-rich-quick schemes instead. Our gurus, like America's and Britain's, are simply holding up a mirror — and it isn't flattering..The Economist.From The Economist, published under licence. The original article can be found on www.economist.com© 2025 The Economist Newspaper Limited. All rights reserved..Financial advice was once doled out solely by well-paid professionals, and solely to the wealthy. Then, from the 1980s, celebrity advisers took their tips to large radio and TV audiences, especially in America. Today legions of social-media “finfluencers” spout off recommendations to anyone, anywhere. As in previous decades, the recommendations of investment gurus—how to cut expenses, build a savings fund or avoid scams—are sensible and universal. Beyond the shared basics, though, their counsel differs in telling ways. They may not know it, but they hold up a mirror to their countries’ financial mores, resisting audiences’ vices or accidentally reinforcing them.In America no young finfluencer yet matches the stature of Dave Ramsey, the gruff 66-year-old radio star turned podcaster. Much of his advice—offered in a stern, fatherly style—is evergreen, built around emergency funds, sensible saving and buying shares for the long term.Mr Ramsey’s advice, however, is puritanical in its attitude to debt. Sensibly, he urges listeners to pay off high-interest consumer debts early. But he also suggests that anyone already saving for retirement or childrens’ education should pay off their mortgages as fast as possible, too—even low-interest loans secured before 2022.The rigid advice is in part a reaction against Americans’ proclivity to spend, spend, spend beyond their means. Even in periods of strong economic growth many households find themselves in financial distress through debt. In the first quarter of 2026, 13% of credit-card balances were 90 days overdue or more, close to the record high from 2010, following the global financial crisis.Britain’s undisputed heavyweight financial guru is Martin Lewis, the founder of “Money Saving Expert”, a website. He channels a different failing: an aversion to investment. Mr Lewis’s stock in trade is practical penny-pinching: supermarket bargains, introductory offers and the benefits of switching banks or utility providers. By his own account, until recently he barely touched the stock market. Only in the past year has he turned his attention to Britain’s individual savings accounts for shares, a generous scheme that allows people to invest up to £20,000 ($26,700) per year without incurring the usual investment taxes.The attitude of Mr Lewis reflects the bleak reality that many Brits own barely any equities. A measly 13% of the financial assets of British households are shares, the lowest of almost any large developed economy. In Ramseyian America the figure is 44%. No amount of scrimping and saving will compensate Britons for missing out on the profound benefits of long-term compound returns.Asian personal-finance sages often pepper advice with research on individual stocks. Rachana Phadke Ranade, a chartered accountant with 5.4m YouTube followers, is one of India’s most prominent finfluencers. Her videos go beyond staid bookkeeping counsel into initial public offerings, stock-market sectors and commodities. Subscriber-only videos focus on stocks of the month. South Korea’s 3PRO TV, a YouTube channel with 3m subscribers, likewise publishes several videos a day, often on market-moving news about the country’s chipmaking giants, Samsung and SK Hynix. It also sells its own investment seminars.The advice reflects the financial culture, rather than the other way around. South Koreans and Indians (at least those with financial resources) save more than Americans or Brits, but suffer from a zeal for day-trading, often backed by leverage. About 8.5m Indians traded risky equity derivatives in the last financial year, up from fewer than 1m eight years ago. A study by Indian regulators suggested that for much of that time, nine in ten retail traders have lost money. South Korea’s stock-market boom has been chased—and driven—by an army of small investors, known as gaemi (“ants”). Between April and June the cumulative loans taken out to invest in stocks hit a record $40.5bn, and many punters are now facing pain as the semiconductor rally turns volatile..Read more:.Red light warning: Top US stock insider sellers in the first quarter include Palantir, Netflix.There is nothing inherently wrong with following short-term market movements. But for most investors, constantly trading shares, let alone derivatives, is as bad an idea as saving too little or prioritising penny-pinching over compound returns. The rules of sound finances are, like Leo Tolstoy’s happy families, alike everywhere. Financial sins are sinful in their own ways—and so it is with financial advice..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox every morning on weekdays. 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What SA's own finfluencers reveal about our financial sins

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