Muni Bond Mutual Funds Report Solid Inflows

Municipal bond mutual funds saw inflows for the 27th consecutive week.

Funds that report their flows weekly recorded inflows of $621 million for the week ended Oct. 17, Lipper FMI numbers show.

That’s down from the $915 million in inflows for the week ended Oct. 10. But it still demonstrates a healthy amount of demand for munis among investors. For further context, muni bond funds have seen inflows for 56 of the past 59 weeks.

Muni bond yields fell on the week, despite a largely positive reception for issuance. The secondary market saw moderate activity, but mostly took a back seat to the week’s largest deals, traders noted.

And muni yield outperformed those of Treasuries on the intermediate and long ends of the curve. This left muni ratios to Treasuries in those parts of the curve richer than they’ve been for much of the year, and even longer at the 30-year mark.

For the year, muni bond mutual funds are up $39.4 billion, Lipper numbers show.

Assets for all muni funds that report their flows weekly increased for a fifth straight week to $315.1 billion from $314.5 billion the week before.

The value of the holdings for weekly reporting funds fell for a second straight week, by $14 million. The week before, they plummeted by $114 million.

The four-week moving average for all municipal bond mutual funds that report their flows weekly saw almost $670 million of inflows, up from a $579 million gain the week before.

Long-term bond funds that report their flows weekly saw strong inflows to the tune of almost $358 million. This represented a rise from the $350 million they reported the week before.

They represented more than half of the total inflows into the market. For the year-to date, long-term bond funds are up $18.1 billion.

High-yield muni funds reported inflows for a fourth consecutive week. Flows have been positive for 44 of the previous 47 weeks.

High-yield funds that report weekly saw $126 million in inflows, Lipper said. The previous week, they reported $155 million in inflows.

Assets for high-yield funds that report their flows weekly increased to $42.95 billion, up from $42.76 billion the week before.

The value of the holdings for weekly reporting high-yield funds increased by $71.5 million. Last week, they increased by $27.5 million.

The four-week moving average for all high-yield municipal bond funds that report their flows weekly was $131 million of inflows, jumping from $76 million the week before.

For the year-to-date, high-yield muni bond funds have seen an increase of $8.2 billion.

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