Money market mutual fund assets broke a 2-week decline and rebounded by $9.42 billion to $3.888 trillion in the week ended Wednesday, February 25, reports the Investment Company Institute in its weekly asset series . ICI also reported its January 2009 "Trends in Mutual Fund Investing" totals, showing money fund assets grew by $62.5 billion in January following 2008's $746.5 billion, or 24%, increase. (The weekly series shows total money fund assets declining by about $16 billion February month-to-date.)
Government fund assets increased by $4.52 billion to $1.417 trillion, Non-government (prime) assets increased by $7.13 billion to $1.992 trillion, but tax-exempt assets decreased by $2.23 billion to $478.27 billion. Tax-exempt money funds have fallen for six weeks in a row from over $501 billion in the first week of the year. Since reaching a year-and-a-half low of $962 billion on Oct. 8, 2008, Prime Institional money funds have risen in 17 of the past 19 weeks, increasing $224 billion, or 23.3%.
Yesterday, ICI also released "Month-End Portfolio Holdings of Taxable Money Market Funds," which shows money funds increased their holdings of U.S. government agency securities, repurchase agreements, and certificates of deposits, but decreased their holdings in U.S. Treasury bills and commercial paper. Repo holdings grew by $65.7 billion in January, agency securities grew by $57 billion and CDs grew by $50.2 billion. T-bill holdings declined by $66.1 billion and CP declined by $25.0 billion.
Taxable money funds now hold $830.6 billion in Government agencies (24.4%), $617.4 billion in Repo (18.1%), $604.2 billion in Commercial Paper (17.7%), $524.9 billion in Treasury bills and securities (15.4%), $522.2 billion in CDs and Eurodollar CDs (15.3%), and $227.3 billion in Corporate and Bank Notes (6.7%). Crane Data's Money Fund Intelligence showed Treasury funds declining by $46.9 billion in January, Government funds increasing $50.5 billion, and Prime funds increasing by $92.9 billion on the month.
