Thanks to WFI's member organizations, we have been able to compile statistics on the number of individual shareholders in the larger markets. In the USA approximately 21 million American households (20%) own individual shares of stock. In Germany the number of individual shareholders (including employee shares holders) is estimated at 4 thousand (2007 data). In Sweden there are approximately 2.2 million individual shareholders, and according to the statistics from 2005-2006, the average male director shareholder owns 15,392 shares, and the average female shareholder owns 4,129 shares. In Poland in 2009, there were 254 thousand active individual shareholders on the stock market.