A recent "JPM Mid-Week US Short Duration Update" featured, "Takeaways from the 2025 Money Fund Symposium." They write, "Over 600 money market participants attended the 17th annual Crane Money Fund Symposium this week in Boston. Here are our key takeaways from the event. 1. Cash is king, with MMF AUMs remaining elevated. Over the past few years, inflows into MMFs have been driven by a combination of safety, liquidity needs, and competitive yields. This trend is unlikely to change anytime soon, given the high degree of uncertainty and the likelihood that policy rates will remain restrictive, leaving cash plentiful in the front end. Most market participants remain optimistic about cash for this year, with expectations that MMF AUMs will continue to trend higher, particularly as we head into 2H where MMFs tend to experience inflows." (Note: Thanks to those who attended our Money Fund Symposium in Boston earlier this week! Attendees and Crane Data Subscribers may access the recordings and MFS Conference Materials here.)
JPM's update continues, "2. Money markets are in a significant phase of transformation given tokenization. Stablecoins and tokenized assets represent innovations with the potential to reshape the cash ecosystem, much like ETFs transformed the mutual funds space. Tokenization allows the industry to upgrade the rails by which it moves value, reducing friction, lowering costs, while improving efficiency. For stablecoins, clear, consistent regulatory guardrails are needed to support broader adoption. Current stablecoin legislation calls for reserve guidelines that are even more restrictive than SEC Rule 2a-7."
It states, "3. Stablecoin adoption will take time... Market participants were generally skeptical that the stablecoin market could reach $2tn anytime soon, though acknowledged that upcoming legislation will bolster growth. Still, the infrastructure/ecosystem for stablecoins remains underdeveloped; it's unclear how the various stablecoins could coexist; and market participants have yet to fully grasp how to incorporate stablecoins into their businesses."
JPM also says, "4. [Stablecoins will be] providing only marginal incremental demand for Treasuries in the near-term. While Treasury Secretary Bessent has leaned on stablecoins as a source of significant demand for Treasuries, and in particular T-bills, most market participants believe that it will only provide a marginal incremental demand for T-bills. It is good messaging as the US government needs to determine how to fund the wider budget deficit, but it is not entirely realistic. The primary source of liquidity for T-bills continues to reside with traditional MMFs."
They tell us, "5. Bring on the T-bills. MMFs were universally in agreement that they would welcome more T-bills, once the debt ceiling is resolved and Treasury issues more T-bills to rebuild the TGA. Repo rates will rise as a result, and the soft funding markets we have seen over the past few months will turn. The Fed is closely monitoring funding markets for signs of stress, including money market rates, reserve levels, and both bank and non-bank balance sheets, while also gathering feedback from market participants."
JPM comments, "In this context, the Standing Repo Facility remains a crucial backstop, with regular participation in small-value operations seen as a prudent preparation for potential stresses in the funding markets. In response to concerns surrounding the X-date, MMFs are actively avoiding T-bills maturing around the projected X-date (August–September). This cautious positioning has led to shorter WAMs and increased reliance on repo to maintain high levels of liquidity."
They add, "6. No recession this year. Across the various panelist discussions, most market participants do not expect a recession this year, though they continued to emphasize the high degree of uncertainty in the current environment. While inflation is gradually easing, risks remain elevated due to ongoing trade tensions and geopolitical instability in the Middle East. The Fed continues to adopt a data dependent approach, carefully balancing inflation, growth, and labor risks while thus avoiding premature rate adjustments."
Finally, J.P. Morgan states, "7. USCP outstandings on the rise. Total U.S. CP outstandings have climbed to $1.4tn, marking a 20% increase year-to-date and reaching the highest level since 2009. This growth has been led primarily by non-financial CP, driven by a shift away from term financing, seasonal funding needs, macroeconomic uncertainty, M&A-related activity, and increased issuance from energy firms. Concurrently, the ABCP sector has expanded, mainly due to independent-sponsored programs, while bank-sponsored multi-seller programs have remained flat. Banks are increasingly turning to ABCP for balance sheet efficiency and capital relief, with an upward trend in issuance expected to continue. Bank CP and CDs have also witnessed growth, with outstandings up 14% year-to-date. This growth reflects banks' broader use of flexible funding tools, including CP, CDs, and time deposits. While CD issuance is expected to continue climbing, CP levels may stabilize around current levels."
In other news, ICI published its latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report on Thursday. The weekly series shows money fund assets rising $7.6 billion to $7.023 trillion, after rising $8.5 billion the week prior. Money fund assets remain just below record levels; they've increased by $719.1 billion (or 11.4%) since the Fed last cut rates on 9/18/24 and have increased by $1.045 trillion (or 17.5%) since 4/24/24. MMF assets are up by $919 billion, or 15.1%, over the past 52 weeks (through 6/25/25), with Institutional MMFs up $476 billion, or 13.1% and Retail MMFs up $443 billion, or 18.1%. Year-to-date, MMF assets are up by just $172 billion, or 2.5%, with Institutional MMFs up $11 billion, or 0.3% and Retail MMFs up $162 billion, or 5.9%.
ICI's weekly release says, "Total money market fund assets increased by $7.64 billion to $7.02 trillion for the eight-day period ended Wednesday, June 25.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds increased by $3.97 billion and prime funds increased by $2.90 billion. Tax-exempt money market funds increased by $780 million." ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs increasing $2.5 billion and Retail MMFs increasing $5.2 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $5.719 trillion (81.4% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $1.163 trillion (16.6%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $140.0 billion (2.0%).
It explains, "Assets of retail money market funds increased by $5.17 billion to $2.90 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets increased by $2.19 billion to $1.82 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $1.71 billion to $946.19 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets increased by $1.27 billion to $127.81 billion." Retail assets account for well over a third of total assets, or 41.2%, and Government Retail assets make up 62.9% of all Retail MMFs.
They add, "Assets of institutional money market funds increased by $2.47 billion to $4.13 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets increased by $1.78 billion to $3.90 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $1.18 billion to $217.16 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $493 million to $12.18 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 58.8% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 94.4% of all institutional MMF totals.
According to Crane Data's separate Money Fund Intelligence Daily series, money fund assets have increased by $4.9 billion in June (through 6/25/25) to $7.405 trillion, after assets hit a record high of $7.406 trillion on June 3. Assets jumped by $100.9 billion in May, fell by $24.4 billion in April, they rose $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, and $15.7 billion last June. 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.
