“The decline in sentiment was again driven by European investors,” said executive vice president and chief innovation officer Jessica Donohue.
In its January 2015 State Street Investor Confidence Index, the corporation said that investors in Europe recorded the “largest decline in sentiment”, with European ICI falling 5.7 points to 113.9.
“Global deflationary fears, geopolitical risk and European political volatility led to declines in sentiment in January,” said developer of the Investor Confidence Index (ICI) Kenneth Froot.
The fall comes as the eurozone recorded previous declines in December 2014, with regional ICI falling 10.2 points.
“It will be interesting to see whether recent sovereign quantitative easing by the ECB [European Central Bank] will offset rising political uncertainty in the eurozone and lead to a stabilisation in sentiment,” said Ms Donohue.
North American and Asian ICI also fell in January by 1.1 points to 101.8 and 99.6 respectively.
“Given soft inflation and retail sales in the US, all eyes will be focused on the Federal Reserve on Wednesday to see if the FOMC [Federal Open Markets Committee] stays on track to raise rates in Q2,” said Mr Froot.
The ICI measures investor confidence and risk appetite by recording the buying and selling habits of institutional investors.
