Outflows from equity fund and bond funds were offset by gains in other Canadian mutual-fund categories
Net sales in Canadian long-term mutual funds reached a mere $43 million in August as investors pulled out dollars from equity and bond funds, according to new figures from the Investment Fund Institute of Canada (IFIC).
In a reversal from the $45 million net sales gained in July, equity funds saw net outflows of $24 million last month. Bond funds saw significantly more pain; while July brought funds in the category $33 million in net sales, it saw $405 million in net redemptions in August.
Sales in balanced funds managed to stay in positive territory at $146 million in net sales, compared to $519 million in July. Meanwhile, specialty funds netted $325 million in August, somewhat less than the $345 million the previous month.
Money-market funds, meanwhile, saw $257 million in net sales from investors last month. It was a welcome turnaround from the $169 million net outflow the category saw in July.
Overall, the IFIC said, the Canadian mutual-fund industry saw $257 million in net inflows in August, in contrast to $772 million in July. Meanwhile, there were heavy inflows into Canadian ETFs last month, which saw the second-strongest month of sales for the year.
But the ETF industry still has a long way to catch up with the more established mutual-fund space. The Canadian ETF Association (CETFA) reported a total of $163.7 billion assets in Canada-listed ETFs as of August, while IFIC’s report shows total mutual-fund industry assets in Canada totalled some $1.535 trillion.
On a per category basis, Canadian-domiciled mutual-fund assets included:
- $788.2 billion in balanced funds;
- $516.4 billion in equity funds;
- $188.3 billion in bond funds;
- $17.2 billion in specialty funds; and
- $25.5 billion in money-market funds
