Crane Data's latest monthly Money Fund Portfolio Holdings statistics will be sent out Tuesday, and we'll be writing our regular monthly update on the new August 31 data for Wednesday's News. But we also uploaded a separate and broader Portfolio Holdings data set based on the SEC's Form N-MFP filings on Monday. (We continue to merge the two series, and the N-MFP version is now available via our Portfolio Holdings file listings to Money Fund Wisdom subscribers.) Our new N-MFP summary, with data as of Aug. 31, includes holdings information from 972 money funds (up 16 from last month), representing record assets of $6.098 trillion (up from $5.965 trillion). Prime MMFs now total $1.252 trillion, or 20.5% of the total. We review the new N-MFP data, and we also look at our revised MMF expense data, which shows charged expenses flat but money fund revenues hitting another record in August. (Note: Register soon for our European Money Fund Symposium, which is Sept. 25-26, 2024 in Edinburgh.)
Our latest Form N-MFP Summary for All Funds (taxable and tax-exempt) shows Repurchase Agreement (Repo) holdings in money market funds totaling $3.032 trillion (down from $3.118 trillion), or 49.7% of all assets. Treasury holdings totaled $1.597 trillion (up from $1.415 billion), or 26.2% of all holdings, and Government Agency securities totaled $699.5 billion (up from $688.9 billion), or 11.5%. Holdings of Treasuries, Government agencies and Repo (almost all of which is backed by Treasuries and agencies) combined total $5.328 trillion, or a massive 87.4% of all holdings.
Commercial paper (CP) totals $288.7 billion (up from $284.2 billion), or 4.7% of all holdings, and the Other category (primarily Time Deposits) totals $156.8 billion (up from $152.9 billion), or 2.6%. Certificates of Deposit (CDs) total $202.9 billion (up from $188.2 billion), 3.3%, and VRDNs account for $121.1 billion (up from $117.8 billion last month), or 2.0% of money fund securities.
Broken out into the SEC's more detailed categories, the CP totals were comprised of: $183.9 billion, or 3.0%, in Financial Company Commercial Paper; $58.2 billion or 1.0%, in Asset Backed Commercial Paper; and, $46.7 billion, or 0.8%, in Non-Financial Company Commercial Paper. The Repo totals were made up of: U.S. Treasury Repo ($2.343 trillion, or 38.4%), U.S. Govt Agency Repo ($618.4B, or 10.1%) and Other Repo ($70.1B, or 1.2%).
The N-MFP Holdings summary for the Prime Money Market Funds shows: CP holdings of $282.2 billion (up from $277.9 billion), or 22.5%; Repo holdings of $460.9 billion (down from $478.4 billion), or 36.8%; Treasury holdings of $93.7 billion (up from $66.7 billion), or 7.5%; CD holdings of $202.9 billion (up from $188.2 billion), or 16.2%; Other (primarily Time Deposits) holdings of $150.3 billion (up from $143.8 billion), or 12.0%; Government Agency holdings of $55.0 billion (down from $66.1 billion), or 4.4% and VRDN holdings of $7.5 billion (up from $7.3 billion), or 0.6%.
The SEC's more detailed categories show CP in Prime MMFs made up of: $183.9 billion (up from $179.4 billion), or 14.7%, in Financial Company Commercial Paper; $58.2 billion (down from $59.4 billion), or 4.6%, in Asset Backed Commercial Paper; and $40.2 billion (up from $39.1 billion), or 3.2%, in Non-Financial Company Commercial Paper. The Repo totals include: U.S. Treasury Repo ($305.3 billion, or 24.4%), U.S. Govt Agency Repo ($91.2 billion, or 7.3%), and Other Repo ($64.3 billion, or 5.1%).
In related news, money fund charged expense ratios (Exp%) were mostly flat in August. Our Crane 100 Money Fund Index and Crane Money Fund Average were 0.27% and 0.37%, respectively, as of Aug. 31, 2023. Crane Data revises its monthly expense data and gross yield information after the SEC updates its latest Form N-MFP data the morning of the 6th business day of the new month. (They posted this info Monday morning, so we revised our monthly MFI XLS spreadsheet and historical craneindexes.xlsx averages file to reflect the latest expenses, gross yields, portfolio composition and maturity breakout, yesterday.) Visit our "Content" page for the latest files.
Our Crane 100 Money Fund Index, a simple average of the 100 largest taxable money funds, shows an average charged expense ratio of 0.27%, up 1 bp from last month's level (and 19 bps higher than 12/31/21's 0.08%). The average is now back at the level (0.27%) it was on Dec. 31, 2019, so we estimate that funds are charging normal expenses (though they are waiving a minimal amount of fees for competitive purposes). The Crane Money Fund Average, a simple average of all taxable MMFs, showed a charged expense ratio of 0.37% as of Aug. 31, 2023, unchanged from the month prior and slightly below the 0.40% at year-end 2019.
Prime Inst MFs expense ratios (annualized) average 0.28% (unchanged from last month), Government Inst MFs expenses average 0.27% (up 1 bp from last month), Treasury Inst MFs expenses average 0.29% (unchanged from last month). Treasury Retail MFs expenses currently sit at 0.52%, (unchanged from last month), Government Retail MFs expenses yield 0.55% (unchanged from last month). Prime Retail MF expenses averaged 0.48% (unchanged from last month). Tax-exempt expenses were also unchanged at 0.40% on average.
Gross 7-day yields rose again during the month ended Aug. 31, 2023. The Crane Money Fund Average, which includes all taxable funds tracked by Crane Data (currently 750), shows a 7-day gross yield of 5.32%, up 8 bps from the prior month. The Crane Money Fund Average was 1.72% at the end of 2019, 0.15% at the end of 2020 and 0.09% at the end of 2021. Our Crane 100's 7-day gross yield was up 8 bps, ending the month at 5.24%.
According to our revised MFI XLS and Crane Index numbers, we now estimate that annualized revenue for all money funds is a record $15.964 billion (as of 8/31/23). Our estimated annualized revenue totals increased from $15.554B last month and are up from $15.521B two months ago. Revenue levels are more than five times larger than May's 2021's record-low $2.927B level. Charged expenses and gross yields are driven by a number of variables, but revenues should continue their climb higher as money funds continue to rake in assets from uninsured bank deposits.
