ICI: MMF Assets Lower in May
ICI's latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report shows MMFs decreasing, following two weeks of increases. Money fund assets are up $215 billion, or 5.0%, year-to-date in 2021. Inst MMFs are up $281 billion (10.1%), while Retail MMFs are down $66 billion (-4.3%). Over the past 52 weeks, money fund assets have decreased by $256 billion, or -6.8%, with Retail MMFs falling by $103 billion (-7.2%) and Inst MMFs falling by $153 billion (-6.5%). ICI's "Assets" release says, "Total money market fund assets decreased by $17.18 billion to $4.51 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, May 5.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds decreased by $11.93 billion and prime funds decreased by $4.75 billion. Tax-exempt money market funds decreased by $504 million." ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs decreasing $10.6 billion and Retail MMFs decreasing $6.6 billion. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $3.916 trillion (86.8% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $500.0 billion (11.1%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $96.1 billion (2.1%). (Note that ICI's asset totals don't include a number of funds tracked by the SEC and Crane Data, so they're almost $400 billion lower than our asset series.) It explains, "Assets of retail money market funds decreased by $6.63 billion to $1.46 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets decreased by $4.20 billion to $1.13 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $2.10 billion to $243.00 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $324 million to $85.54 billion." Retail assets account for just under a third of total assets, or 32.4%, and Government Retail assets make up 77.5% of all Retail MMFs. ICI adds, "Assets of institutional money market funds decreased by $10.56 billion to $3.05 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets decreased by $7.73 billion to $2.78 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $2.64 billion to $257.01 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $180 million to $10.55 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 67.6% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 91.2% of all Institutional MMF totals.
