[UNLOCKED] Fund Flow Survey | Foreign Funds In Major Drawdown Territory

Editor's Note: Below is a complimentary research note originally published last week by our Financials team. For more info on our institutional research email sales@hedgeye.com.

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Investment Company Institute Mutual Fund Data and ETF Money Flow:

In early March of this year, international equity mutual funds began to lose favor rapidly. Over that period, the category's 52-week moving average has collapsed from +$2.0 billion to -$112 million per week, including the most recent week's -$1.7 billion outflow. There are only two prior periods on record where the rolling 52 week moving average has gone negative in an indication of receding risk appetite, mid-2008 and early 2012. International equity funds have been a bedrock of diversification by financial advisors, as over the past 25 years, the best performing stock market annually has been outside of the U.S. We are extremely cautious on trends in the active management industry as International Equity is a high fee product and has been offsetting even weaker trends in domestic stock funds. 

In other categories, domestic equity funds lost another -$3.8 billion and total bond funds gained +$1.3 billion. In ETFs, equities gained +$320 million but were outpaced by fixed income's +$2.3 billion inflow. Finally, investors pulled -$11 billion from money market funds.

 

In the most recent 5-day period ending August 31st, total equity mutual funds put up net outflows of -$5.5 billion, trailing the year-to-date weekly average outflow of -$4.1 billion and the 2015 average outflow of -$1.6 billion.

 

Fixed income mutual funds put up net inflows of +$1.3 billion, trailing the year-to-date weekly average inflow of +$3.0 billion but outpacing the 2015 average outflow of -$475 million.

 

Equity ETFs had net subscriptions of +$5.8 billion, outpacing the year-to-date weekly average inflow of +$339 million and the 2015 average inflow of +$2.8 billion. Fixed income ETFs had net inflows of +$1.0 billion, trailing the year-to-date weekly average inflow of +$1.8 billion and the 2015 average inflow of +$1.0 billion.

 

Mutual fund flow data is collected weekly from the Investment Company Institute (ICI) and represents a survey of 95% of the investment management industry's mutual fund assets. Mutual fund data largely reflects the actions of retail investors. Exchange traded fund (ETF) information is extracted from Bloomberg and is matched to the same weekly reporting schedule as the ICI mutual fund data. According to industry leader Blackrock (BLK), U.S. ETF participation is 60% institutional investors and 40% retail investors.

Most Recent 12 Week Flow in Millions by Mutual Fund Product: Chart data is the most recent 12 weeks from the ICI mutual fund survey and includes the weekly average for 2015 and the weekly year-to-date average for 2016:

 

 

 

 

 

Cumulative Annual Flow in Millions by Mutual Fund Product: Chart data is the cumulative fund flow from the ICI mutual fund survey for each year starting with 2008.

 

 

 

 

 

Most Recent 12 Week Flow within Equity and Fixed Income Exchange Traded Funds: Chart data is the most recent 12 weeks from Bloomberg's ETF database (matched to the Wednesday to Wednesday reporting format of the ICI), the weekly average for 2015, and the weekly year-to-date average for 2016. In the third table are the results of the weekly flows into and out of the major market and sector SPDRs:

 

 

Sector and Asset Class Weekly ETF and Year-to-Date Results: In sector SPDR callouts, investors redeemed -4% or -$308 million from the long duration treasury TLT ETF.

 

Cumulative Annual Flow in Millions within Equity and Fixed Income Exchange Traded Funds: Chart data is the cumulative fund flow from Bloomberg's ETF database for each year starting with 2013.

 

 

Net Results:

The net of total equity mutual fund and ETF flows against total bond mutual fund and ETF flows totaled a negative -$2.0 billion spread for the week (+$320 million of total equity inflow net of the +$2.3 billion inflow to fixed income; positive numbers imply greater money flow to stocks; negative numbers imply greater money flow to bonds). The 52-week moving average is -$5.1 billion (negative numbers imply more positive money flow to bonds for the week) with a 52-week high of +$20.2 billion (more positive money flow to equities) and a 52-week low of -$19.0 billion (negative numbers imply more positive money flow to bonds for the week.)

 

Exposures: The weekly data herein is important for the public asset managers with trends in mutual funds and ETFs impacting the companies with the following estimated revenue impact:

 

 

Jonathan Casteleyn, CFA, CMT 

203-562-6500 

 

Joshua Steiner, CFA

203-562-6500

 

Patrick Staudt, CFA

203-562-6500