8 January 2024

• New experimental statistics on distribution of household wealth in euro area provide quarterly information to policy makers, in line with national accounts
• First new data show that household net wealth in euro area increased by 29% over last five years, with homeowners’ net wealth increasing more than that of non-homeowners
• Inequality, as measured for example by share of wealth held by top 5% versus bottom 50%, decreased slightly over past five years

The European Central Bank (ECB) has today published experimental statistics on Distributional Wealth Accounts (DWA) to provide quarterly and timely household distributional information that is consistent with the national accounts. The new data have been developed to support the ECB’s 2021 monetary policy strategy, which aims to include a systematic assessment of the two-way interaction between income and wealth distributions and monetary policy^[1]. The release also follows recommendations of the G20 Data Gaps…