For example, terms such as "online trading platform" or "trading account" are unfamiliar to more than two-thirds of respondents: specifically, 65% in Slovakia and 68% in the Czech Republic, or 68% and 71%, respectively. Both populations fare even worse with more technical terms, such as forex, which is unfamiliar to 78% of Slovaks and 83% of Czechs.

While on the one hand ignorance is no excuse, it is not something that cannot be easily remedied. The main thing for any developed society is the willingness of its members to learn. And in this respect the Slovaks and the Czechs are, unsurprisingly, again very similar and this time deserve praise.

The largest group of those who would be interested in trading on the financial markets said that the first step would be to take an educational course or study professional information. The difference was shown in the second most frequent answer, where 34 % of those in Slovakia would start by seeking an investment advisor. In the Czech Republic, trust in advisers is much higher, and 43 % of those interested would go to them first.

Apart from this, the survey identified only one major deviation, namely in the number of respondents who already trade online independently in the financial and capital markets. While in Slovakia 35 % of those interested in the issue, in the Czech Republic it is a full 44 %.

The survey of a representative sample of 506 Czechs and 520 Slovaks was carried out this year by the educational organisation Axil Academy in cooperation with the Ipsos agency.

Robert Paľuš, Axil Academy lecturer

*Trading financial instruments, such as shares and their derivatives, on financial and capital markets via online platforms.