The habitus of the Russian stock market private investors

The national stock markets in the CIS countries were introduced back in the 1990s. The most progress, both in terms of turnover and number of issuers, is shown by stock markets in Russia, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, while markets in Turkmenistan and Tajikistan are lagging behind. Regardless of overall results, every national stock market has formed its own community of private investors group of individuals who invest their savings in securities. The stock market private investors’ community is considered by the author as a specific actor in the socio-economic system, which bears certain habitus. The author shows some of the Russian private investors’ habitus components social characteristics, lifecycle and types of private investors, and defines the direction of the habitus transformation based at his own research in 2006-2015. Contemporary Russian private investors’ habitus is primarily defined by speculative operations, but certain trend for the long-term investing is rising in their community. Transformation of the private investors’ habitus is ongoing, and it may cause change of the entire Russian population habitus in relation to the stock market value as investment tool. The results of the Russian stock market private investors’ habitus research should be used in elaborating of government strategies for the stock markets development both in Russia and other CIS countries to ensure more active participation of population in true investments, and inject additional money into the national economies.