ICI: Money Fund Assets Lower Again
ICI's latest "Money Market Fund Assets" report shows assets falling for the second week in a row after several weeks of minor gains. The release says, "Total money market fund assets decreased by $5.21 billion to $4.50 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, September 8, the Investment Company Institute reported today. Among taxable money market funds, government funds decreased by $1.50 billion and prime funds decreased by $3.35 billion. Tax-exempt money market funds decreased by $363 million." Money fund assets are up by $207 billion, or 4.8%, year-to-date in 2021. Inst MMFs are up $305 billion (11.0%), while Retail MMFs are down $97 billion (-6.4%). ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs decreasing $5.9 billion and Retail MMFs increasing $0.7 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $3.942 trillion (87.5% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $471.0 billion (10.5%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $90.8 billion (2.0%). Over the past 52 weeks, money fund assets have increased by $36 billion, or 0.8%, with Retail MMFs falling by $102 billion (-6.7%) and Inst MMFs rising by $138 billion (4.7%). (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 Crane's asset series.) They explain, "Assets of retail money market funds increased by $682 million to $1.43 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets increased by $1.43 billion to $1.13 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $746 million to $217.14 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets were unchanged at $79.50 billion." Retail assets account for just under a third of total assets, or 31.7%, and Government Retail assets make up 79.2% of all Retail MMFs. ICI adds, "Assets of institutional money market funds decreased by $5.89 billion to $3.08 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets decreased by $2.93 billion to $2.81 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $2.61 billion to $253.86 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $358 million to $11.28 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 68.3% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 91.4% of all Institutional MMF totals.
