Americans are now the richest nation in the world because they have overtaken the Swiss, while the rest of the world is gradually "melting away" wealth.

This is due to the confusion over Brexit and the US-China trade war, research results show.

According to the latest Global Wealth Report by German insurance company Allianz, the average net financial assets of people living in the US are € 184,411 ($ 203,128) per capita, compared to the € 173,838 private wealth of a Swiss.

The rise of the US to the top of the list of richest nations is largely owed to the strength of the dollar, as well as to US households, which are the main drivers of growth in the global flow of funds, as two-thirds of all savings in industrialized countries come from the US, the insurance company said.

The report also says the new savings charted a global record as it rose 22 percent to more than 2,700 billion euros. This was attributed to last year's US tax reform, which saw US citizens increase new savings by 46 percent.

Although the US took first place in the report, Switzerland is still at the top in terms of gross financial assets per capita, with a figure of EUR 266,318 compared to the US $ 227,364.

Both Switzerland and the US are also far ahead of third-ranked Singapore, where total net financial wealth per capita is only $ 100,370.

Generally speaking, the Alliance report is quite pessimistic about global wealth prospects, and also indicated that global financial wealth growth has fallen by 0.1 percent in 2018, the first time since the 2008 financial crisis.

They blamed the US-China trade war on uncertainty over Brexit, which increased geopolitical tensions and "tightening monetary conditions".