LONDON (Reuters) - Bullish global investors yanked almost $20 billion out of cash funds over the last week and piled $13.6 billion into bonds, another $8 billion into stock markets and the ninth highest amount on record into inflation-linked U.S. bonds.
BOFA analysts, citing data from financial flow tracking firms such as EPFR, said strong consumer, U.S. housebuilder and China tech and inflation-linked bond moves were all putting upward pressure on bond yields - which is what traditionally ends bull markets.
Their number-crunching showed the 4th largest weekly inflow to municipal bonds at $1.9 billion and $1.2 billion into U.S. inflation-linked TIPS bonds. That, they said, showed "investors discounting Dem (Democratic party) sweep in November," referring to the upcoming U.S. election.
It was also another large week of investment-grade bond fund inflows at $10.7 billion, a 19th week of inflows into high-yield bonds in the last 20 weeks, while $4.8 billion was shovelled into U.S. equity funds, the largest in nine weeks.