Crane Data published its latest Weekly Money Fund Portfolio Holdings statistics and summary yesterday. Our Weekly Holdings track a shifting subset of our monthly Portfolio Holdings collection. The most recent cut (with data as of Jan. 24) includes Holdings information from 84 money funds (up 17 from a week ago), which represent $1.841 trillion (up from $1.481 trillion) of the $3.811 trillion (48.3%) in total money fund assets tracked by Crane Data. (See our Jan. 13 monthly Money Fund Portfolio Holdings update, "Jan MF Portfolio Holdings: Big FICC Repo, Agency Rebound; CDs, CP Drop." Note that our Weekly MFPH are e-mail only and aren't available on the website.)
Our latest Weekly MFPH Composition summary again shows Government assets dominating the holdings list with Repurchase Agreements (Repo) totaling $640.4 billion (up from $502.4 billion a week ago), or 34.8%, Treasury totaling $545.9 billion (up from $543.3 billion a week ago), or 29.6% and Government Agency securities totaling $335.9 billion (up from $256.9 billion), or 18.2%. Certificates of Deposit (CDs) totaled $108.7 billion (up from $60.2 billion), or 5.9%, and Commercial Paper (CP) totaled $95.2 billion (up from $57.8 billion), or 5.2%. A total of $79.3 billion or 4.3%, was listed in the Other category (primarily Time Deposits), and VRDNs accounted for $36.2 billion, or 2.0%.
The Ten Largest Issuers in our Weekly Holdings product include: the US Treasury with $545.9 billion (29.6% of total holdings), Federal Home Loan Bank with $239.4B (13.0%), Fixed Income Clearing Co with $114.8B (6.2%), BNP Paribas with $58.9B (3.2%), Federal Farm Credit Bank with $58.5B (3.2%), RBC with $54.0B (2.9%), Credit Agricole with $41.7B (2.3%), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group with $34.1B (1.9%), Wells Fargo with $32.5B (1.8%) and JP Morgan with $32.2B (1.7%).
The Ten Largest Funds tracked in our latest Weekly include: JP Morgan US Govt ($156.1B), Fidelity Inv MM: Govt Port ($130.9B), Goldman Sachs FS Govt ($126.8B), Federated Govt Oblg ($102.5B), Wells Fargo Govt MM ($86.5B), Fidelity Inv MM: MM Port ($75.9B), JP Morgan 100% US Treas MMkt ($75.8B), JP Morgan Prime MMkt ($66.2B), Goldman Sachs FS Treas Instruments ($65.0B) and Morgan Stanley Inst Liq Govt ($64.3B). (Let us know if you'd like to see our latest domestic U.S. and/or "offshore" Weekly Portfolio Holdings collection and summary, or our Bond Fund Portfolio Holdings data series.)
In other news, rates on money market funds and brokerage sweep accounts remained largely flat last week. Our Money Fund Intelligence Daily shows that the flagship Crane 100 MF Index dropped a basis point to 1.42%. The Crane 100 is down from 1.81% on Sept. 30 and down from 2.18% on June 30. It is down 77 bps from the beginning of 2019 (2.23%), but up from its near low of 0.06% ten years ago (12/31/09). The Crane Brokerage Sweep Index, which is currently 0.12%, is up 7 bps from ten years ago (0.05%) and down 16 bps from the end of 2018 (0.28%). Our latest Brokerage Sweep Intelligence, with data as of Friday, Jan. 24, shows only one major brokerage lowering rates in the past week.
The Crane Money Fund Average, which includes all taxable funds tracked by Crane Data, shows a 7-day yield of 1.30%, down a basis point in the week through Friday, Jan. 24. Treasury Inst MFs were down by 1 bps to 1.32%. Government Inst MMFs and Prime Inst MMFs were also down 1 bps, finishing the week at 1.38% and 1.52%, respectively. Treasury Retail MFs currently yield 1.05%, (down 0.01%), Government Retail MFs yield 1.07% (down 0.01%), and Prime Retail MFs yield 1.36% (down 0.01%), Tax-exempt MF 7-day yields decreased 0.01% to 0.48%.
Crane's Brokerage Sweep Index remained flat at 0.14% in the week ended January 24 (for balances of $100K), and Raymond James was the only firm that lowered rates. They dropped their rates on most balances by 3 bps; their 100K tier now offers a 0.05% rate. RJ also lowered rates on their higher tiers by 5 and 10 bps. E*Trade and TD Ameritrade currently have the lowest rate for balances at the $100K level (0.01%). Meanwhile, Fidelity continues to have the highest sweep rate (0.82%). (Fidelity also has a higher-yielding money fund option for new accounts.) Morgan Stanley is paying 0.03%. UBS, Merrill, Raymond James and Wells Fargo are all paying 0.05%, and Schwab is paying 0.06%. Ameriprise is paying 0.08% and RW Baird is paying 0.33% for balances of $100K.
Crane Data has also started tracking some of the other brokerages beyond the largest ones in our Brokerage Sweep Intelligence, just for internal purposes. Securities America currently has the lowest rate for balances at the $100K level (0.05%). Meanwhile, Betterment has the highest sweep rate (1.83%) with Robinhood in second (1.80%). LPL and SSN Securities are paying 0.10% and 0.12%, respectively. Folio Institutional offers rates of 0.14% and Edward Jones offers rates of 0.15% on balances of 100K. JPMS Brokerage is paying 0.20%, while Commonwealth is paying 0.25%. TIAA is paying 0.26%, Cetera is paying 0.40% (up 8 bps from two weeks ago), Pershing and Ally Bank are paying 0.75%, Pershing Dreyfus is paying 0.79%. And, JPMS Advisory is paying 1.50% for balances of $100K.
Finally, a website named Quartz published, "China no longer runs the world’s largest money market fund." They write, "China's flagship money market fund is no longer the world's largest. Ant Financial's Yu'e Bao, which means 'leftover treasure,' has ceded this title to two American funds. The shift comes as Chinese authorities wrestle with the country's fast-growing investment industry. Yu'e Bao ... took the global lead for assets under management in 2017, but has recently fallen behind money market funds managed by JPMorgan and Fidelity, according to data from Fitch Ratings.... The fund has $157 billion in assets under management as of December, compared with around $268 billion in March 2018." (See Crane Data's April 11, 2019 News, "China's Yu'e Bao No Longer World's Largest MMF.")
The piece explains, "Yu'e Bao shocked banking executives around the world with its immense growth. It started when the widely used payment service Alipay (operated by Ant Financial, an affiliate of Alibaba at the time) added the money market fund to its app. The fund was designed for spare cash, and Chinese consumers began using it like a checking account. They are able to pay for anything, from haircuts to hot pot dinners, directly out of their high-yielding investment holdings, seamlessly and easily."
It adds, "As concerns about the sheer size of Yu'e Bao grew, Ant Financial adopted voluntary measures that likely curtailed its expansion. In 2017, for example, Tianhong Asset Management capped Yu'e Bao's individual users' daily and total subscriptions at 20,000 RMB ($2,800) and 100,000 RMB respectively. Those measures have since been lifted."
