Money Fund Assets Jump Again
ICI's latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report shows assets jumped for the second week in a row in July. Year-to-date, MMFs are down by $132 billion, or -2.8%, with Institutional MMFs down $130 billion, or -4.0% and Retail MMFs down $1 billion, or -0.1%. Over the past 52 weeks, money fund assets are up by $94 billion, or 2.1%, with Retail MMFs rising by $39 billion (2.7%) and Inst MMFs rising by $55 billion (1.8%). (For the month of July, MMF assets increased by $23.5 billion to $5.002 trillion according to Crane's MFI XLS, which tracks a broader universe of funds than ICI.) ICI's weekly release says, "Total money market fund assets increased by $16.03 billion to $4.57 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, July 13, the Investment Company Institute reported.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds increased by $6.11 billion and prime funds increased by $11.05 billion. Tax-exempt money market funds decreased by $1.13 billion." ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs rising $10.3 billion and Retail MMFs increasing $5.7 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $4.021 trillion (87.9% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $448.7 billion (9.8%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $103.5 billion (2.2%). ICI explains, "Assets of retail money market funds increased by $5.68 billion to $1.47 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets increased by $313 million to $1.14 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $6.21 billion to $230.85 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $842 million to $92.79 billion." Retail assets account for just under a third of total assets, or 32.1%, and Government Retail assets make up 77.9% of all Retail MMFs. They add, "Assets of institutional money market funds increased by $10.34 billion to $3.11 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets increased by $5.80 billion to $2.88 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $4.83 billion to $217.83 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $289 million to $10.68 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 67.9% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 92.6% of all Institutional MMF totals. (Note that ICI's asset totals don't include a number of funds tracked by the SEC and Crane Data, so they're over $400 billion lower than Crane's asset series.)
