Mutual Funds Inflows/Outflows

Recent Fund Flow Estimates
Date	Net Inflows/Outflows ($ Millions)
2 biz days ended Feb. 5	1,305
3 biz days ended Feb. 1	-2,378
2 biz days ended Jan. 29	-4,887
2 biz days ended Jan. 25	10,919
2 biz days ended Jan. 22	1,855
2 biz days ended Jan. 18	1,474
2 biz days ended Jan. 16	-3,775
3 biz days ended Jan. 11	13,249
2 biz days ended Jan. 8	-8,441
2 biz days ended Jan. 4	21,223
2 biz days ended Jan. 2	-15,900
Source: TrimTabs.com

Investors stuffed a little more than $1.3 billion into equity funds during the two business days ended Feb. 5, estimates TrimTabs.com, a firm that tracks fund inflows and outflows.

Were it not for heavy inflows on Friday, Feb. 2, however, TrimTabs estimates that fund flows would have been negative for the two days ended Feb. 5. Indeed, TrimTabs estimates that investors pulled $5.3 billion out of equity funds on Monday.

For the two business days ended Feb. 5, equity funds in the U.S. fared much better than funds that invest overseas. Investors poured almost $1.9 billion into U.S. equity funds while investors withdrew $575 million from international equity funds.

For the two days ended Feb. 5, the Nasdaq took a big hit and fell 5%; the S&P 500, meanwhile, lost 1.4% and the Dow slipped 0.2%.

Why This Metric Matters Mutual funds are the biggest source of liquidity in the market, according to TrimTabs.com. When fund inflows slow or actually turn negative (outflows), then stock prices will likely turn downward as well. The stocks most heavily influenced by inflow changes are those that are most widely held by mutual funds, such as Microsoft (MSFT Quote) and Cisco (CSCO Quote) recently. TrimTabs.com computes its estimate of overall mutual fund inflows and outflows by tracking 534 equity funds. A definitive tally comes from the Investment Company Institute, the mutual fund trade group, which tracks more than 4000 equity funds. ICI only reports its data once a month, about thirty days after the end of the last month it's considering. Because of the lag in the ICI data, TrimTabs.com's twice-weekly estimate is closely followed by the market.

How Often Updated on TSC Twice weekly, Monday and Wednesday

Historical Info The highest inflows recorded in the year 2000 came during the week ending Feb. 3, when inflows totaled $18.4 billion. Those inflows helped the market register big gains for the week, with the Nasdaq rallying almost 9% and the Dow rising about 3%. The largest outflow recorded for the year, $12.1 billion, was for the week ending Oct. 12. That week the Dow fell nearly 6.5% and the Nasdaq almost 9%.

Top of page | Back to Metrics