Comparison of Long-Term Returns of Household Savings Accounts, Government Bonds, Stock Indices, and Residential Real Estate in the Czech Republic, the USA, the Eurozone, the United Kingdom, and Japan from the 1970s to 2025

The thesis focuses on comparing the long-term returns of four classes of investment instruments—savings, five-year government bonds, stock indices, and residential real estate—in selected countries: the Czech Republic, the United States, the euro area, the United Kingdom, and Japan. Returns are measured using the internal rate of return (IRR), calculated from time series of monthly or quarterly values covering the period from 1970 to 2025. Calculations are performed over rolling five-year periods, with results subsequently transformed to a quarterly frequency to enable correlation analysis. The main contribution of the thesis lies in the application of a unified computational methodology across different asset types in five economies. To ensure comparability, returns are derived solely from market price developments or index values recorded at the end of each month or quarter. For savings instruments and bonds, the calculated values include reinvested interest and market-valued coupons, respectively. In contrast, dividends and rental income are excluded from the returns of stocks and real estate. The results are presented through charts and correlation matrices, illustrating the evolution of returns and interrelationships between instruments over time and across countries. The analysis confirms that residential real estate does not always deliver the highest returns and that asset performance is significantly influenced by regional and temporal factors.