The changing nature of Pakistani savings habits

There are almost one million mutual fund accounts owned by individuals in Pakistan, and the average account has more than one million rupees in it. The aggregate numbers of individuals saving through mutual funds, or directly investing in the stock market, are still tiny, but after decades of stagnating, they are finally beginning to rise again, and that has implications for the economy, and for the country’s financial institutions.

First, a look at some of the headline numbers: the mutual fund industry has seen absolutely explosive growth over the past few years, with assets under management (AUM) increasing 7 times during the fiscal years between 2019 and 2025 (fiscal year ends June 30), with industry-wide AUM hitting Rs3.8 trillion ($13.6 billion) as of June 30, 2025, according to data from the Mutual Funds Association of Pakistan (MUFAP).

What makes this data more impressive is the degree to which it is reliant not just on financial institutions and corporations utilizing mutual funds for short-term parking of cash, but by individuals for long-term savings. During that same period, the total number of individuals who have mutual fund accounts increased from 243,000 to 669,000, a rise of 175%. Those individuals own about 936,000 accounts as of the end of fiscal year 2025, with total assets in those accounts of Rs1.16 trillion, which puts the average balance in each account at Rs1.24 million (Rs12.4 lac).

Of the individuals who do own mutual funds, the average amount they hold in mutual funds across all their accounts comes out to Rs17.4 lac in 2025, more than doubling from just Rs8.4 lac in 2019.

The numbers on the stock exchange side are smaller, but still rather impressive. The total number of individuals with brokerage accounts has crossed 500,000 recently, and was languishing around 204,000 in 2019. The recent run up in the stock market no doubt pulled in some investors from the sidelines.

These numbers are still a tiny fraction not just of the total population, but also of the relatively small middle class in Pakistan.