Investors charged back into mutual funds with a vengeance in early February. According to statistics released today by the Investment Company Institute, investors poured an estimated $13.17 billion into equity, bond and hybrid mutual funds during the week ended Wednesday, Feb. 8. That’s 65% more than the $7.96 billion mutual funds posted in fresh inflows the week before and the largest weekly inflow this year.
Bond funds received the biggest infusion, receiving an estimated $7.05 billion. Of that, $5.31 billion went to taxable bond funds with the remaining $1.74 billion going to municipal bond funds.
Next up were equity funds, which posted an estimated $3.62 billion in inflows for the week, almost evenly divided between U.S. and foreign stock funds. U.S. equity funds gained $1.92 billion in new investments, more than making up for the $1.81 billion they lost the week before. Foreign equity stocks also saw a big improvement, posting $1.70 billion in inflows, up dramatically from the $108 million they captured the previous week.
Hybrid funds—those that invest in both stocks and fixed-income securities—came in third, attracting $2.49 billion in investor money, up slightly from the $2.20 billion it posted in inflows a week earlier.
The weekly fund flow estimates are derived from data covering more than 95% of industry assets, according to ICI. The statistics cover long-term mutual funds, those the ICI defines as investing in long-term instruments.
Margarida Correia writes for
