The research found confidence grew most in low income earners with 58 per cent of those who earn between $20,001 and $50,000 per annum feeling confident, up from 49 per cent in last year's survey.
It was high to middle income earners which had the most confidence at 65 per cent.
Everett said it was not surprising to see confidence levels increasing according to peoples' personal income, "however it's very encouraging to see confidence growing among investors as a whole and among lower and middle income earners in particular."
People aged 50-64 years old were among the most confident at 68 per cent, along with 67 per cent of people surveyed who lived in Auckland.
Everett said it was pleasing to see high confidence in that age-group as it was a group which had been impacted in the past by investment failures.
"It is also a very vulnerable age-group."
People in that age-group often had accumulated money but appeared to be vulnerable to scams.
There was a reluctance for people to get advice in that age-group, he said, which made it a focus for the FMA.
The research found the number of people surveyed who were not confident in the markets had fallen from from 35 per cent to 26 per cent since 2013.
The number of people who had heard of the FMA increased 4 percentage points but remained low at 39 per cent.
Everett said it was going up much slower than he would like to see.
"People who need help, need to know who we are."
The FMA also got a lot of valuable information from people calling up with queries.
Everett said it had been working with other agencies like the Commission for Financial Capability, the NZX and putting out more warnings and scam notices to raise awareness of what it did and it would continue to be a focus.
The online survey questioned 1000 people.
See the full report here:
