After some down time, we are bringing back weekly analysis of the U.S. fund market. In this weekly piece I’ll be touching on market events, FTSE Russell index performance, and overall trends using LSEG Lipper data—focusing more on the fixed income fund market. The general layout will go as follows: a recap of relevant macro events, followed by a table summary of the latest fund market data, then lastly some commentary. The commentary will either focus on the overall weekly numbers or a specific classification/macro-group trends. If there are any follow-up questions on the data/products presented or specific insights you’d

  Equity mutual funds and ETFs celebrated their fifth quarterly gain in six—with the average equity fund (+6.92%) posting its second straight quarterly plus-side return. LSEG Lipper’s U.S. Diversified Equity Funds (+9.07%) outpaced the other seven equity and mixed-assets macro-classifications for the first quarter since Q2 2023. Q1 2024 had actively managed equity funds (+7.09%) outperform their passive (+5.95%) counterparts by 114 basis points (bps), marking the fourth largest quarterly outperformance by active management since the start of 2013. In this segment, I provide a market recap plus highlight the quarterly and monthly performance results for conventional equity mutual funds

The data sourced in the article below is derived from Lipper’s Global Fund Flows application. GFF can be found on LSEG Workspace (“FundFlows”). During LSEG Lipper’s fund-flows week that ended March 6, 2024, investors were overall net purchasers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the third week in four, adding a net $27.3 billion. Money market funds (+$13.1 billion, +0.10%), taxable bond funds (+$12.4 billion, +1.03%), equity funds (+$2.6 billion, +1.21%), tax-exempt bond funds (+$869 million, +0.40%), and alternatives funds (+$108 million, +0.11%) attracted net new capital. Commodities funds (-$1.0 million, +4.54%) and mixed-assets funds (-$765

Since 1999, Lipper has classified eligible equity funds based on the fundamentals of the portfolio’s underlying holdings. Over time, while various updates were applied to the quantitative, the outputs remained a constant staple in the investment industry. The group of Lipper equity classifications that are analyzed by the model is known as the Holdings-Based Classifications or HBCs. Altogether, the classifications create the famed style box matrix which depicts a portfolio’s primary allocation to size and fundamental style of the investments held within. Starting in May, Lipper will be rolling out its largest update ever to this methodology. While the fundamental

During Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week that ended February 13, 2023, investors were overall net purchasers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the first week in three, adding a net of $5.6 billion. Money market funds (+$8.7 billion) were the only group to log inflows. Equity funds (-$1.7 billion), taxable bond funds (-$1.3 billion), and tax-exempt bond funds (-$68 million) all reported outflows. Index Performance At the close of Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week, U.S. broad-based equity indices reported plus-side performance. The Nasdaq (+1.34%) reported its seventh straight week of positive returns, while the DJIA (+0.53%), S&P 500

Fixed income funds realized a return of positive 2.82% on average during the fourth quarter of 2022. This was the first positive quarterly performance for fixed income funds of the year and the largest quarterly return since Q2 2020. Of the 51 Lipper fixed income classifications, 49 ended the quarter with plus-side quarterly returns. In each of the first two quarters of 2022, all 51 classifications realized sub-zero performance. In the third quarter, 48 posted a loss. All 51 classifications improved on their quarterly returns in the final quarter of 2022. Summary: Taxable bond funds (+2.65%) underperformed tax-exempt bond funds

During Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week ended August 10, 2022, investors were overall net redeemers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the third week in four, removing a net $8.7 billion. Both money market funds (-$11.9 billion) and tax-exempt funds (-$4.9 billion) suffered outflows, while equity funds (+$4.4 billion) and taxable bond funds (+$3.8 billion) attracted new capital. Index Performance At the close of Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week, U.S. broad-based equity indices traded positive for the sixth week in seven—S&P 500 (+1.33%), Nasdaq (+1.47%), Russell 2000 (+3.16%), and DJIA (+1.51%). The Bloomberg Municipal Bond Total Return Index

During Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week ended July 27, 2022, investors were overall net purchasers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the third week in four, adding a net $6.1 billion. Money market funds (+$6.0 billion), equity funds (+$372 million), and tax-exempt bond funds (+$237 million) logged weekly inflows, while taxable bond funds (-$537 million) suffered outflows. Money market funds have reported four straight weeks of inflows. Index Performance At the close of Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week, U.S. broad-based equity indices traded positive for the fourth week in five—S&P 500 (+1.61%), Nasdaq (+1.13%), Russell 2000 (+1.12%), and

Lipper Natural Resources Funds suffered $1.3 billion in outflows over the past week, marking their third-largest weekly outflow on record. This past week, funds within the classification averaged a loss of 10.64%. Lipper Natural Resources Funds have realized two of their 10-top lowest all-time weekly performances in the back-to-back weeks. The only other two weeks that posted larger outflows were fund-flows weeks ended October 1, 2014 (-$2.5 billion), and January 16, 2019 (-$1.4 billion). Both these weeks were followed by significant drops in gas and oil prices. Today, we are seeing massive spikes in all energy prices, which helps the

The Columbia Seligman Technology & Info Fund, A Shares (SLMCX) is one of the best Lipper Science & Technology Funds using Lipper Leader metrics for the month ended May 30, 2022. The way the fund is able to achieve such consistent returns through even turbulent markets includes having an experienced team and having as big-picture outlook so as to allow for the flexibility to pick securities opportunistically, according to lead portfolio manager Paul Wick. We spoke with Wick to find out how his team manages its portfolio and its outlook on the science and technology sectors. Lipper Leader Ratings and

During Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week ended June 22, 2022, investors were overall net sellers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the second straight week, withdrawing a net $20.1 billion. Taxable bond funds (-$11.2 billion), equity funds (-$5.4 billion), money market funds (-$1.9 billion), and tax-exempt bond funds (-$1.6 billion) all suffered outflows. Index Performance At the close of Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week, U.S. broad-based equity indices traded negative for the second week straight—Russell 2000 (2.36%), S&P 500 (-0.79%), DJIA (-0.60%), and Nasdaq (-0.42%) Fixed income indices traded positive for the first week in three, with the

During Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week ended June 8, 2022, investors were overall net purchasers of fund assets (including both conventional funds and ETFs) for the second week in three, pumping in $19.2 billion. Money market funds (+$24.3 billion) reported weekly inflows, while taxable bond funds (-$2.8 billion), tax-exempt bond funds (-$2.1 billion), and equity funds (-$274 million) suffered outflows. Index Performance At the close of Refinitiv Lipper’s fund-flows week, U.S. broad-based equity indices traded positive for the third week straight—Russell 2000 (+1.95%), Nasdaq (+0.77%), S&P 500 (+0.35%), and DJIA (+0.30%). Fixed income indices traded down with the Bloomberg Municipal Bond