The November issue of Crane Data's Money Fund Intelligence newsletter was sent to subscribers on Saturday along with our October 31 performance data, rankings and indexes. (Our 10/31 Money Fund Portfolio Holdings will be published on Nov. 14.) The latest publication includes the articles, "Banks, Bonds Continue Drawing Cash From MFs," which discusses the outflows from money funds and big inflows into bank savings and bond funds; "State Street's Fortuna on Fund Connect Portal," our monthly fund "profile" which again features one of the large online money market trading "portals"; and, "Fund CEOs on Regulations Say Squam Out, Buffer In," which reviews recent comments on possible regulatory changes for money funds. (Note that we published over the weekend because several of our staff will be at the Association for Financial Professionals Annual Conference in Boston Sunday, Nov. 6 through Wed., Nov. 9. Look for us at Booth #1805 and see Pete Crane present on "Under The Cash Hood: Looking Beyond Yield at Money Market Mutual Fund Holdings" Monday at 4pm.)
Our lead article says, "Money market mutual fund assets were down moderately (-$18.7 billion) in October, though assets remain above $2.6 trillion -- the same level they rebounded to the week following the resolution of the debt ceiling crisis (8/10). But competitors on both sides -- banks and bonds -- continue to attract assets at a strong pace." Two charts in MFI show asset changes year-to-date (through 9/30/11) in money funds, bank money market deposit accounts (MMDAs), and bond funds; and a longer term view of asset changes in money funds vs. bank MMDAs."
The November issue also comments, "This month we feature another online money market trading "portal" in our "profile" interview. Money Fund Intelligence interviews Greg Fortuna, Managing Director at State Street Global Markets, and Peter McHugh, Vice President for the company’s Fund Connect platform in Europe. Fund Connect is announcing the rollout of its Transparency Connect analytics module at this week's Association for Financial Professionals' (AFP) annual conference. Our Q&A follows."
Finally, we write, "While there's no official word on the next round of money fund regulations, a couple of fund industry heavyweights weighed in recently on the topic. On recent quarterly earnings call, both BlackRock and Federated's management made comments regarding possible future regulatory changes. We reprint and excerpt them here."
Our monthly Money Fund Intelligence XLS, which contains a host of performance statistics on money funds, rankings and our Crane Indexes, has already been uploaded to the website and e-mailed to clients, and our Money Fund Wisdom database has been updated with October 31, 2011 data. Watch for more excerpts from our latest MFI in coming weeks, or e-mail info@cranedata.us to request the latest issue.
