U.S. fund investors, mostly from financial institutions, plowed $9.6 billion back into equities in the week that ended Wednesday, marking the best performance since mid-September, data from Thomson Reuters' Lipper showed on Thursday.
Exchange-traded funds, which anecdotally are seen representing professional investors' behavior, accounted for all the net inflows for equity funds. One fund, the State Street SPDR S&P 500 ETF, accounted for nearly half the net inflows, with $4.5 billion in fresh capital committed.
Excluding ETF activity, equity funds report net cash outflows totaling $1.13 billion.
The inflows occurred during a week in which the U.S. benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 stock index rose more than 3 percent and closed at its highest level since the market started to crumble in the spring of 2008.
Even as risk appetites rose, so did the desire to hold fixed-income assets.
Taxable bond funds had net inflows of $5.9 billion while tax-free municipal bond funds took in a net $700 million.
Money market mutual funds had net redemptions of $6.8 billion. The sector has had money pulled out in 10 of the last 12 weeks, Lipper's data shows.
The weekly Lipper fund flow data is compiled from reports issued by U.S.-domiciled mutual funds and exchange-traded funds.
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