This collaboration between NZSA and University of Canterbury (UC) Business School is part of our mission to promote a thriving market and to be the voice of investors. A sentiment index will contribute to the understanding of investor behaviour and the overall market and allow you to get first access to the data and make better-informed investment decisions.
Have your say!
Each week, a random selection of NZSA members are sent an email to complete the survey. If you wish to participate in the NZ Investor Sentiment Index Survey anyway, you can click on this link anytime – also contained in each Briefing newsletter. The sentiment survey is conducted weekly from Thursday 12:01am to Wednesday 11:45pm.
This Week’s Results:
This week’s commentary – February 18th, 2026
New Zealand stock market sentiment
Bullish sentiment of individual investors about the short-term direction of the NZ stock market decreased in this week’s survey while bearish and neutral increased.
- Bullish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, decreased by 21.4 percentage points to 50.0%.
- Neutral sentiment, expectations that stock prices will essentially stay unchanged over the next six months, increased by 4.8 percentage points to 33.3%.
- Bearish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, increased by 16.7 percentage points to 16.7%.
New Zealand sector level sentiment
Bullish decreases for most sectors, while neutral and bearish increases for most sectors.
- The level of optimism among individual investors is highest for energy (60.0%), followed by primary sector (58.3%) and industrials (54.6%). The level of optimism is lowest for real estate (16.7%), followed by health care (25.0%) and consumer discretionary (33.3%).
- The level of neutral sentiment is highest for health care (75.0%), followed by consumer discretionary (58.3%) and real estate (50.0%). Neutral sentiment is lowest for energy (20.0%), followed by IT (27.3%) and primary sector (33.3%).
- The level of pessimism is highest for real estate (33.3%), followed by energy (20.0%) and IT (18.2%). Pessimism is lowest for industrials and health care (both at 0.0%), followed by primary sector and consumer discretionary (both at 8.3%).
International sentiment
Bullish and bearish regarding the short-term direction of the Australian market decreased. Simultaneously, neutral increased in this week’s survey. Investor sentiment about the short-term direction of the U.S. market is the same except for bullish.
- Bullish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will rise over the next six months, decreased by 4.8 percentage points to 66.7% for Australian stocks and increased by 15.5 percentage points to 58.3% for U.S. stocks.
- Neutral sentiment, expectations that stock prices will stay flat over the next six months, increased by 19.0 percentage points to 33.3% for Australian stocks and by 33.3 percentage points to 33.3% for U.S. stocks.
- Bearish sentiment, expectations that stock prices will fall over the next six months, decreased by 14.3 percentage points to 0.0% for Australian stocks and by 48.8 percentage points to 8.3% for U.S. stocks.
New Zealand personal investment sentiment
If the investor were to purchase equity, the proportion of investors planning to increase their investment in small cap shares and funds decreased compared to last week. Conversely, the proportion of those who planning to increase their investment in large cap shares increased, others remained the same.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their small cap shares decreased by 18.6 percentage points to 10.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their large cap shares increased by 30.0 percentage points to 30.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating an increase in their funds decreased by 11.4 percentage points to 60.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors anticipating no change in their equity allocation remained the same at 0.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
- The proportion of investors who express uncertainty about their equity allocation remained the same at 0.0% this week if they were to purchase equity.
Historic Data
There have been wide variations since the survey began (January 2020) in Investor Sentiment. The following chart shows:
- the lowest recorded response for each type of sentiment (the lower ‘whisker’)
- the recorded responses between 25th – 75th percentile (the ‘box’)
- the median response score – ie, exactly 50% of scores are above and below this number
- the maximum response (excluding ‘outliers’)
- Interestingly, NZ Investors have displayed a greater tendency towards expressing “negative” (bearish) sentiment since the survey’s inception.