ICI: Money Fund Assets Inch Lower
ICI published its latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report Thursday. The weekly series shows money fund assets falling $4.1 billion to $6.908 trillion, after rising $31.7 billion the week prior and falling $125.4 billion two weeks ago (these massive tax outflows were the largest weekly outflow in history). Money fund assets have still risen in 25 of the last 39, and 36 of the last 54 weeks, increasing by $604.9 billion (or 9.6%) since the Fed cut on 9/18/24 and increasing by $931.0 billion (or 15.6%) since 4/24/24. MMF assets are up by $907 billion, or 15.1%, in the past 52 weeks (through 4/30/25), with Institutional MMFs up $470 billion, or 13.1% and Retail MMFs up $437 billion, or 18.1%. Year-to-date, MMF assets are still up by $58 billion, or 0.8%, with Institutional MMFs down $57 billion, or -1.4% and Retail MMFs up $115 billion, or 4.2%. ICI's weekly release says, "Total money market fund assets decreased by $4.12 billion to $6.91 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, April 30.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds decreased by $6.11 billion and prime funds decreased by $1.55 billion. Tax-exempt money market funds increased by $3.54 billion." ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs decreasing $0.2 billion and Retail MMFs decreasing $3.9 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $5.637 trillion (81.6% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $1.131 trillion (16.4%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $140.6 billion (2.0%). It explains, "Assets of retail money market funds decreased by $3.92 billion to $2.85 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets decreased by $7.90 billion to $1.80 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $732 million to $920.84 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets increased by $3.24 billion to $128.57 billion." Retail assets account for well over a third of total assets, or 41.3%, and Government Retail assets make up 63.2% of all Retail MMFs. They add, "Assets of institutional money market funds decreased by $194 million to $4.06 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets increased by $1.79 billion to $3.84 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $2.28 billion to $210.22 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets increased by $299 million to $11.99 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 58.7% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 94.5% of all institutional MMF totals. According to Crane Data's separate Money Fund Intelligence Daily series, money fund assets have fallen by $24.4 billion in April (through 4/30/25) to $7.299 trillion, hitting a record high of $7.384 trillion on April 3. Assets rose by $2.8 trillion in March, $94.2 billion in February, $52.8 billion in January, $110.9 billion in December, $200.5 trillion in November, $97.5 billion in October, $149.8 billion in September, $109.7 billion in August, $16.6 billion in July, $15.7 billion in June and $91.4 billion in May. They declined by $15.8 billion in April 2024. Note that ICI's asset totals don't include a number of funds tracked by the SEC and Crane Data, so they're over $330 billion lower than Crane's asset series.
