Equity funds experienced net inflows of $21 billion in April, benefiting from a turnaround in investor confidence, according to Lipper of Summit, N.J. That comes after the largest net outflows from equity funds ever in March, according to Lipper.
U.S. diversified equity funds led all equity categories in net inflows in April with $13.8 billion, nearly two-thirds of the total, according to Lipper. World equity funds were second with $2.7 billion.
Long-term bond funds suffered net outflows of $3.1 billion, after three straight months of net inflows, according to Lipper. That may be due to increased interest in equity funds as well as the payment of taxes, the company said. Short and intermediate-term bonds had inflows of $1.7 billion. Municipal money-market funds had outflows of $10.2 billion, while taxable money-market fund flows remained flat, according to Lipper.
All categories of California municipal bond funds and money market funds had outflows, totaling $3.5 billion in April due to a reduction in the state's credit quality in anticipation of debt-financed relief to two local electric utilities, according to Lipper. Those funds represent only 3.8 percent of all tax-exempt fund assets, but represented 29 percent of April's total tax-exempt fund outflow.
