Spouses — mostly women — could inherit $9 trillion from their partners in the next 25 years

• Older generations are set to pass on trillions of dollars. Much of that money will go to spouses.
• A new UBS report said spouses, largely women, could inherit $9 trillion.

There's a huge wave of money and other assets set to change hands — and a good chunk of it will go to spouses, especially women.

Dubbed the "Great Horizontal Wealth Transfer" by UBS in the bank's 2024 Global Wealth Report released this week, the term describes asset transfers within the same generation.

Out of the $83 trillion to be inherited in the next 25 years, UBS estimated $9 trillion will go to women of the same generation.

"We'll see spouses inheriting wealth, rather than it going straight down to [their] children," said Paul Donovan, chief economist of UBS Global Wealth Management, at a media event on Wednesday.

That kind of transfer could have substantial implications for the next generation. For starters, a notable portion of the Great Wealth Transfer to later generations could be delayed by four years, the amount of time that UBS anticipates women will outlive their male spouses. The people passing down wealth are, on average, 84 years old, UBS said.

When women inherit assets, even from their spouses, they may also manage it differently, Donovan said.

A March Bank of America report analyzing the differences in financial habits between genders found that women tended to make less risky investment decisions. The bank attributed this difference to women having lower retirement income from the gender wage gap and higher costs for working women, like childcare.

BofA also highlighted that women's risk appetite often varies with wealth and age. Younger women with significant household wealth, for example, are more financially confident than older wealthy women.

Philanthropic causes stand to benefit from this feminization of wealth, as women are more likely to donate a portion of their wealth to charity and sustainable investing than men. Nearly 90% of wealthy women made charitable donations in 2022, and they're much more likely than men to donate to women-focused causes according to BofA.

Globally, the Americas still hold the largest percentage of the world's transferable wealth — over 50%, per UBS's tally.

While women in the US stand to gain significantly from the next round of vertical and horizontal transfers, the same cannot be said internationally. Per BofA, more than 40 countries still restrict transferring wealth equally between genders.