Americans grew richer at the end of last year, due to healthy stock-market gains that offset a slowing housing market, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

In its quarterly "Flow of Funds" report, the Federal Reserve said household net worth -- a measure of a household's assets minus its liabilities -- grew 1.4 trillion dollars in the fourth quarter to 55.6 trillion dollars, up 2.4 percent from 54.3 trillion dollars in the third quarter.

The fourth-quarter gain was due mostly to financial assets including stocks, bonds and pensions that grew 3.2 percent to 42.1 trillion dollars. For example, the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index rose 8.8 percent in the quarter.

Household real-estate holdings eked out a 0.9 percent gain between third and fourth quarters, ending the year at 22.6 trillion dollars.

The report also found that Americans appear to be turning more cautious about accumulating debt. The growth in household debt slowed to 6.6 percent in the fourth quarter from 7.5 percent in the third quarter.

According to calculations by economists at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., the Fed data mean that mortgage-equity withdrawal, which had been a vital source of spending for many households, fell to an annual rate of 168 billion dollars in fourth quarter, its lowest level since the third quarter of 2001.

Equity withdrawal peaked in the third quarter of 2005, and the latest figures will test the widely held view that declines in home-equity extraction will lead to a falloff in consumer spending.

The data also implied that wealthier Americans received the bulk of the gains. That is because while two-thirds of Americans, including most wealthy and middle-class families, own homes, financial assets are heavily concentrated among a small percentage of wealthy Americans, according to the Journal.

Source: Xinhua