Money Fund Assets Move Higher
The Investment Company Institute's latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report shows assets rising after a drop last week and a big jump the prior week. The release says, "Total money market fund assets increased by $12.22 billion to $4.57 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, November 10, the Investment Company Institute reported.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds increased by $13.66 billion and prime funds decreased by $256 million. Tax-exempt money market funds decreased by $1.18 billion." Money fund assets are up by $270 billion, or 6.3%, year-to-date in 2021. Inst MMFs are up $362 billion (13.1%), while Retail MMFs are down $92 billion (-6.0%). ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs increasing $13.4 billion and Retail MMFs decreasing $1.1 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $4.025 trillion (88.1% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $454.3 billion (9.9%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $87.6 billion (1.9%). Over the past 52 weeks, money fund assets have increased by $238 billion, or 5.5%, with Retail MMFs falling by $106 billion (-6.9%) and Inst MMFs rising by $343 billion (12.3%). (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.) ICI explains, "Assets of retail money market funds decreased by $1.13 billion to $1.43 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets increased by $208 million to $1.15 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $966 million to $208.17 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $372 million to $77.09 billion." Retail assets account for just under a third of total assets, or 31.4%, and Government Retail assets make up 80.1% of all Retail MMFs. They add, "Assets of institutional money market funds increased by $13.35 billion to $3.13 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets increased by $13.45 billion to $2.88 trillion, prime money market fund assets increased by $710 million to $246.15 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets decreased by $809 million to $10.50 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 68.6% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 91.8% of all Institutional MMF totals.
