As we wrote a week ago, the Investment Company Institute recently published its "2024 Investment Company Fact Book," an annual compilation of statistics and commentary on the mutual fund industry. We reviewed much of the money fund content in our May 17 News, "ICI Publishes 2024 Fact Book, Reviews US, Worldwide Money Funds in '23." But below we focus on the numerous "Data Tables" involving "Money Market Mutual Funds." ICI lists annual statistics on shareholder accounts, the number of funds, net assets, net new cash flows, paid and reinvested dividends, composition of prime and government funds, and net assets of institutional investors by type of institution. (Note: Please register ASAP for our Money Fund Symposium show, which will be held June 12-14, 2024 in Pittsburgh, Pa!)
ICI's annual statistics show that there's been a steady decline in the number of money market mutual funds over the last 17 years. (See Table 35 in the Data Tables.) In 2023, according to the Fact Book, there were a total of 275 money funds, down from 291 in 2022, 305 in 2021, 340 in 2020, 364 in 2019, 802 in 2007, and down from 1,014 in 2001. The number of share classes stood at 1,009 in 2022, down from 1,044 in 2022, 1,060 in 2021, 1,108 in 2020, 1,126 in 2018 and 1,998 in 2008.
Table 36, "Money Market Funds: Total Net Assets by Type of Fund," shows that total net assets in taxable U.S. money market funds increased $1.143 trillion to a record $5.919 trillion in 2023. At year-end 2023, $3.613 trillion (61.0%) was in institutional money market funds, while $2.306 trillion (39.0%) was in retail money market funds. Breaking the numbers down by fund type, $952.4 billion (16.1%) was in prime funds, $4.843 trillion (81.8%) was in government money market funds, and $123.6 billion (2.1%) was in tax-exempt accounts.
Also, Table 37, "Money Market Funds: Net New Cash Flow by Type of Fund," shows that there was a 957.0 billion in net new cash flow into money market funds last year. A closer look at the data shows $443.2 billion in net cash inflows into institutional funds and a $513.9 billion cash inflow into retail funds. There were also $699.5 billion in net inflows from Government funds, versus $249.1 billion in net inflows from Prime funds.
Table 39, "Money Market Funds: Paid and Reinvested Dividends by Type of Fund," shows dividends paid by money funds were a new record, $247.7 billion, $170.3 billion of which was reinvested (68.8%). Dividends previous record was as high as $127.9 billion in 2007 (when rates were over 5%), and as low as $5.2 billion in 2011 (when rates were 0.05%). Reinvestment rates were 64.4% in 2007 and 62.3% in 2011, so they've remained relatively stable over the past decade.
ICI's Tables 40 and 41, "Taxable Government Money Market Funds: Asset Composition as a Percentage of Total Net Assets" and "Taxable Prime Money Market Funds: Asset Composition," show that of the $4.843 trillion in taxable government money market funds, 13.4% were in U.S. government agency issues, 43.9% were in Repurchase agreements, 36.2% were in U.S. Treasury bills, 7.3% were in Other Treasury securities, and -1.0% was in "Other" assets. The average maturity was 37 days, up 22 days from the end of 2022.
The second table shows that of the $952.4 billion in Prime funds at year-end 2023, 27.4% was in Certificates of deposit, 23.8% was in Commercial paper, 40.9% was in Repurchase agreements, 0.2% was in US government agency issues, 2.6% was in Other Treasury securities, 0.2% was in Corporate notes, 0.3% percent was in Bank notes, 0.7% was in US Treasury bills, 0.6% was in Eurodollar CDs, and 3.4% was in Other assets (which includes Banker's acceptances, municipal securities and cash reserves).
Table 60, "Total Net Assets of Mutual Funds Held in Individual and Institutional Accounts," shows that there was $1.976 trillion of assets in money funds with Institutional investors, and $3.943 trillion in MMF assets in Individual accounts in 2023.
Finally, Table 62, "Taxable Money Market Funds: Total Net Assets of Institutional Investors by Type of Institution and Type of Fund," shows of the total of $1.970 trillion in Total Institutional assets ($1.813 trillion in Institutional funds and another $157.4 billion in Retail funds), $893.1 billion were held by business corporations (45.3%), $810.6 billion were held by financial institutions (41.1%), $179.6 billion were held by nonprofit organizations (9.1%), and $86.9 billion were held by Other (4.4%).
