Lipper Fund Flows: Domestic Equity Funds Lose While Markets Gain Ground
By Jeff Tjornehoj Stock markets rebounded this past week after Greece came back to the bargaining table with its creditors and acceded to even harsher demands than it had rejected a week earlier and after stocks in China appeared to slow their freefall. For the fund-flows week ended July 15, the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 535 points to end above 18,000 and regained ground it had lost over the prior three weeks of the Greek debt drama. Equity mutual fund investors withdrew an estimated $4.4 billion net for the week. Not surprisingly, they pulled money from domestic equity mutual funds (-$1.6 billion), which have been out of favor much of this year. Equity exchange-traded funds (ETFs) saw net inflows of $3.6 billion, although investors may have been taking profits, selling off financial services products (-$1.6 billion). The week’s biggest individual equity ETF recipient was the S PDR S&P 500 Trust ETF ( SPY , +$4.4 billion ) , while huge selling hit the F inancial Select Sector SPDR ETF ( XLF , -$1.5 billion ) and the iShares MSCI EAFE ETF ( EFA , -$975 million ) . Bond mutual fund investors continued to redeem shares of funds in Lipper’s High Yield Funds classification, which had net outflows of $272 million, while ETF investors in the same classification added a net $1.5 billion. Overall, taxable bond mutual funds saw net inflows of $473 million for the week. Mutual fund investors pulled some cash out of Core Bond Funds (-$234 million) and added a scant $97 million to Core Plus Bond Funds. Bond ETF investors pushed $2.2 billion into their accounts to create combined (mutual funds and ETFs) net inflows of $2.6 billion. The week’s top destinations for bond ETF investors were the iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF ( HYG , +$1.0 billion ) and the SPDR Barclays Capital High Yield Bond ETF ( JNK , +$420 million ) . Municipal bond mutual fund investors pulled $75 million from their accounts for the eleventh weekly net outflows in a row. Money market funds saw net outflows of $9.4 billion, of which institutional investors pulled $9.3 billion and retail investors redeemed $100 million. Share this article with a colleague