Money Fund Assets Rise Again
The Investment Company Institute's latest weekly "Money Market Fund Assets" report shows assets rising for the second week in a row and the third week out of the past four. The release says, "Total money market fund assets increased by $8.85 billion to $4.58 trillion for the week ended Wednesday, November 17, the Investment Company Institute reported.... Among taxable money market funds, government funds increased by $9.20 billion and prime funds decreased by $915 million. Tax-exempt money market funds increased by $571 million." Money fund assets are up by $278 billion, or 6.5%, year-to-date in 2021. Inst MMFs are up $371 billion (13.4%), while Retail MMFs are down $93 billion (-6.1%). ICI's stats show Institutional MMFs increasing $9.2 billion and Retail MMFs decreasing $0.3 billion in the latest week. Total Government MMF assets, including Treasury funds, were $4.034 trillion (88.2% of all money funds), while Total Prime MMFs were $453.4 billion (10.0%). Tax Exempt MMFs totaled $88.2 billion (1.9%). Over the past 52 weeks, money fund assets have increased by $246 billion, or 5.7%, with Retail MMFs falling by $106 billion (-6.9%) and Inst MMFs rising by $352 billion (12.6%). (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 $320 million to $1.43 trillion. Among retail funds, government money market fund assets increased by $317 million to $1.15 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $856 million to $207.32 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets increased by $219 million to $77.31 billion." Retail assets account for just under a third of total assets, or 31.3%, and Government Retail assets make up 80.1% of all Retail MMFs. They add, "Assets of institutional money market funds increased by $9.17 billion to $3.14 trillion. Among institutional funds, government money market fund assets increased by $8.88 billion to $2.89 trillion, prime money market fund assets decreased by $59 million to $246.09 billion, and tax-exempt fund assets increased by $352 million to $10.85 billion." Institutional assets accounted for 68.7% of all MMF assets, with Government Institutional assets making up 91.8% of all Institutional MMF totals.
