Stock Market Gains Create New Millionaires in 2025: UBS

A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide for the high-net-worth investor and consumer. subscription To receive future issues, directly to your inbox.

Nearly 1 million people will become millionaires in 2025, thanks in large part to the stock market boom, according to a new report from UBS.

The Swiss bank estimated that the United States is responsible for nearly half of these new millionaires, adding an average of more than 1,200 new millionaires per day last year, an annual increase of about 441,000.

UBS found that stock market gains boosted global personal wealth by 10.8%, the biggest jump since 2017 and more than double the rate in 2024 and 2023. However, this strong growth is belied by declines in median wealth in most of the 56 markets tracked by UBS, suggesting a growing wealth gap.

In the United States, for example, average wealth per adult declined by about 20% from 2020 to 2025, while average wealth increased by about 10% over the same time period, after deducting inflation, according to an analysis of bank data.

UBS estimates that the world’s millionaires, which the bank estimates at 58 million, own nearly half the world’s wealth, or roughly $250.6 trillion.

James Mazo, an economist at UBS, told CNBC that wealthier individuals had greater gains compared to the broader population last year, as they had greater exposure to financial markets, noting that the US stock market rose about 18% in 2025.

“The higher you go on the wealth spectrum, the more closely related wealth creation is to the performance of your business or your investment portfolio — or both,” Mazo said at a news conference.

These gains are also uneven among the ranks of millionaires. The bank estimates that the combined assets of so-called common millionaires, or individuals with wealth between $1 million and $5 million, have jumped 170%, net of inflation, since 2000. Over the same period, the collective wealth of their richest peers has risen 343%.

As for the world’s billionaires, their collective net worth rose nearly 25% in the year ending in April, according to UBS. However, the report noted that much of this rise is due to an increase in the number of billionaires, not just members of the Three Comma Club becoming richer.

The decline in the value of the US dollar last year also contributed to discrepancies in global wealth creation as the bank tracks wealth in US dollars. The number of millionaires in America, while still the largest in the world, rose by a modest 1.9% in 2025, while most European and Middle Eastern markets saw higher percentage gains, including Turkey (6.4%) and the United Arab Emirates (3.5%). In terms of combined personal assets, the growth rate in the Americas was estimated at 8.5%, outpacing the Asia-Pacific region at 5.9% but less than half the 17.5% rate recorded in EMEA.

Mazo said it is too early to predict how the Iranian war will affect high-net-worth individuals in the Middle East. Asset allocation and currency trends are among the many factors that will determine the outcome.

“It will really depend on the share of international assets held by these investors,” he said. “If you are, for example, based in the Middle East, and most of your wealth is tied up in US stocks, and on top of that, you have a currency linked to the US dollar, well, currency movements don’t matter at all.” “Now, if you tend to diversify your holdings into other investments that tend to be in currencies that have appreciated against the US dollar, and if we measure things in US dollars, that gets a slightly better outlook for 2026.”

He added that investors may have changed their investment portfolios as a result of the conflict.

He asked, “Will they diversify their holdings? Will they provide more direct investments in the United States? How will the unfolding situation change the investment landscape, investment philosophy, and asset allocation?” He said. “i don’t know yet.”