Investing March 31, 2004

ICI: Mutual Fund Assets Higher in February

March 31, 2004 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - The nation's mutual funds continued their rise in February, gaining $97 billion, following January's 1.6% increase.
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Mutual funds saw their combined assets increase for the fifth month in a row in January to $7.6 trillion from a revised $7.5 trillion in the previous month (See Mutual Fund Assets Continue Rise in January ) mostly a result of the increases in stock funds and hybrid funds, according to data from the Investment Company Institute (ICI).

Stock funds enjoyed an inflow of $91.2 billion, an increase of 2.4%, reaching $3.9 trillion in net assets, followed by a 2.4% increase in hybrid funds, which were up $10.8 billion over January’s total.   Also seeing money flowing into their coffers were bond funds.   Taxable bond funds gained 0.8% in net new assets in February ($7.1 billion), while municipal bond funds were up $5.6 billion, 1.7%.

The sole loser for the month was the taxable money market funds, down to $18.8 billion, a decrease of 1.1%. By comparison, tax-free money market funds gained $1 billion, 0.3% in February.

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