UK launches £50m 'Savvy the Squirrel' campaign to lure savers into markets

City firms are pinning their hopes on a government-endorsed advertising blitz fronted by a finance "savvy" CGI squirrel to encourage cautious British savers to shift out of cash and start investing. The long-awaited retail investment campaign, which will cost up to £50m, is part of the chancellor Rachel Reeves' nationwide push to encourage more financial risk taking, amid fears risk-averse consumers are losing out and ultimately stymying UK growth.

Chris Cummings, the chief executive of the Investment Association lobby group, which is steering the campaign, said: "Every year since the global financial crisis, we've had more well-intentioned regulation that has come in that has been designed to offer consumer protection. "But where we've ended up is protecting people out of capital markets, and that's why we've got this."

The campaign, originally announced in Reeves' Mansion House speech last summer, will run for between three and five years at an annual cost of about £8m to £10m. That sum will be covered by 20 City backers including Barclays, Aviva, Schroders, Robinhood UK, L&G and JP Morgan.

So far that has led to the creation of an animated squirrel named "Savvy" which – through a series of online, TV and billboard adverts launching from Thursday – campaigners hope will compel animal-loving Britons to dip their toes into the financial markets.

"We didn't want an Einstein to lead the campaign for investing. That could have put people off," Cummings said. "And so we were looking for a character that people would relate to and enjoy spending time with, and Savvy the Squirrel came through … [as] somebody who they felt they could have a conversation with. "Obviously it's a British red squirrel," Cummings added.

The campaign slogans include "squirrelling away your money?" and "Saved a bit? Why not invest a bit?" The advertising design has been led by media agencies M+C Saatchi and the7stars.

It comes after reports in February of rows over the design and costs of the advertising campaign, according to the Financial Times, which obtained AI-generated draft designs of a different red squirrel, one in a hot tub and another lounging with a drink by a pool in a Hawaiian shirt. It said investment platforms AJ Bell, Interactive Investor, Trading 212, Freetrade and Octopus Money also withdrew from the project, primarily on the grounds of costs.

The now-finalised campaign will not push savers towards any specific financial product, nor towards UK-specific investments. However, City lobbyists hope the campaign, alongside a growing list of other regulatory changes, could help revive the UK stock market. It comes as the London Stock Exchange continues to lose stock market listings and floats to foreign rivals.

It will target a wide range of UK consumers, including the seven million adults that hold more than £10,000 in cash savings, according to Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) research. Keeping savings in cash has effectively eroded their spending power, the Investment Association (IA) said. Modelling by the IA showed that if a saver had put £10,000 in a cash ISA a decade ago, it would be worth about £8,400 today due to inflation. If they had invested that same £10,000 in a global equity fund, their savings would now be worth more than £19,700.

The advertising blitz comes two years after the Labour government scrapped plans for a separate "Tell Sid"-style campaign featuring veteran newsreader Sir Trevor McDonald, aimed at selling the government's then remaining stake in NatWest to the British public. That was meant to evoke memories of Thatcher-era "Tell Sid" adverts, which encouraged everyday consumers to buy shares in the newly privatised British Gas in 1986.

The City minister Lucy Rigby, who is launching the new retail investment campaign alongside Reeves at the London Stock Exchange on Thursday, said: "With greater awareness of the benefits of investing, more people will be able to make informed decisions about how to make their savings work harder for them. "That will mean greater prosperity and financial resilience for households across the country and strengthened domestic capital markets too."

The Treasury, Money and Pensions Service and the Financial Conduct Authority are supporting the campaign in an advisory capacity.