For the first time in 12 weeks, municipal bond funds reported a cash outflow as retail investors cashed out ahead of the April 15 tax filing date.
Municipal bond funds which report, weekly, posted $300.580 million of outflows in the week ended April 1, after experiencing inflows of $581.664 million in the week ended March 25, according to the latest Lipper data.
The four-week moving average remained positive at $141.929 million in the latest week after being in the green at $319.195 million in the prior week. A moving average is an analytical tool used to smooth out price changes by filtering out fluctuations.
Up until this week, muni bond funds had seen inflows in each week of 2015, according to Lipper data. Inflows for the year total about $5.21 billion.
Long-term muni bond funds also saw ouflows, losing $49.567 million in the latest week, after experiencing inflows of $569.870 million in the previous week.
High-yield muni funds recorded an inflow of $1.733 million in the latest reporting week, after seeing inflows of $306.515 million in the previous week. Exchange-traded funds had inflows of $72.441 million, after recording inflows of $83.348 million in the previous week.
In contrast, long-term municipal bond mutual funds posted $727 million of inflows in the week ended March 25, according to the Investment Company Institute. ICI reported that inflows into long-term funds were $194 million in the previous week.
