More than half of Britons who acted on social media financial advice lost money, TSB survey finds #

New TSB data shows that more than half of Britons who acted on financial advice found online ended up losing money, and most said they regretted it.

The survey of nearly 2,000 UK adults found that 32% had acted on financial advice from social media platforms in the past 12 months. Of that group, 56% reported losing money as a result, up from 55% in the previous year’s survey. Those who suffered losses lost an average of nearly £700.

Almost six in ten (59%) of those who followed social media financial tips said they later wished they had not done so. Despite this, 56% of those who encountered such content said they trusted it. Trust was highest among younger respondents, reaching 72% of 25-34-year-olds, who were also the most likely to act on what they saw: 49% in that age group said they had followed social media financial advice in the past year, compared with 22% of 45-54-year-olds and 18% of those aged over 55. Savings tips and investment ideas were the most common categories acted upon, cited by 27% and 18% of the younger cohort respectively.

Forty-six percent of respondents said they did not know how to check the credentials of someone offering financial advice online, leaving many unable to tell regulated professionals from unqualified influencers.

One in four respondents said they had turned to AI tools for financial guidance, a figure that rose to 43% among 25-34-year-olds. More than half of all respondents (51%) said they were not confident they could identify when financial information had been produced by an AI system rather than a qualified human source.

The Financial Conduct Authority has stepped up enforcement against unregistered finfluencers. Enforcement actions reached 74 in 2025, up from 27 in 2024 and 11 across the four preceding years combined, covering warning alerts, cease-and-desist orders, and in some cases criminal proceedings and arrests, according to Computer Weekly, which obtained the figures through a freedom-of-information request.

TSB has previously linked social media content to investment fraud. The bank’s internal data identifies social media as the most common origin of push-payment investment fraud cases it processes.

Source: Financial Reporter