Fitch says "U.S. MMF Reform Could Shift Corp. Cash Management". They write, "Fitch Ratings believes additional money market fund (MMF) reform has the potential to fundamentally change the nature of the MMF industry and, in turn, significantly affect corporate cash management practices. Holdings of cash and other liquid assets at U.S. nonfinancial corporations rose to $2.2 trillion in December 2011, up 18% from the end of 2010 according to the Federal Reserve's data. That was the highest level since the series began in 1945. A significant portion of this cash is held in banks' deposits, which was already swelling with deposits after the 2008 crisis. We attribute a large part of the growth of banks' deposit to the temporary unlimited government insurance covering non-interest-bearing checking accounts until Dec. 31, 2012. As a result, total insured bank deposits, including both corporate and retail, increased from $5.9 trillion in the second quarter of 2008 to $7.3 trillion at the end of June of 2011. We believe the expiration of unlimited government insurance for non-interest-bearing checking accounts could prompt corporate treasurers to seek diversification in their cash management options. We note that, in anticipation, asset management firms' are strategically repositioning liquidity management businesses in order to capture excess corporate cash. In particular, we believe further MMF reform will likely lead managers to expand their product offerings beyond MMFs, possibly resulting in one unintended consequence. A potential decrease in information transparency for short-term market participants and regulators could occur, should more cash be moved from highly regulated and transparent MMFs into other parts of the financial system. For example, corporate investors may shift liquid funds into separately managed cash accounts (SPA) as an alternative to MMFs." See also, ICI's Money Market Mutual Fund Assets.
