Muni Bond Funds See $545M in Inflows

Investors are still high on the muni market. They continue to allocate money to municipal bond mutual funds, which this week once again saw solid inflows.

Funds that report their flows weekly recorded inflows of $545 million for the week ended Nov. 28, Lipper FMI numbers show. That compares to inflows of $1.07 billion from weekly reporting funds for the week ended Nov. 21, in what was the strongest week of inflows since early August.

Muni bond funds have been positive for the majority of 2012. For context, they have now seen inflows for 61 of the past 65 weeks.

Triple-A yields also continue to push lower into record territory this week at the 10-year and 30-year sections of the curve. Investors have expressed concerns over the potential for higher income tax rates, and are being lured by tax-exempt muni bonds.

Assets for all muni funds that report their flows weekly increased for a 10th straight week to $323.6 billion from $321.9 billion the week before.

The value of the holdings for weekly reporting funds was positive for a sixth straight week, growing by $1.08 billion. The week before, they increased by $897 million.

The four-week moving average for all municipal bond mutual funds that report their flows weekly saw $797 million of inflows, up from a $630 million gain the week before.

Long-term bond funds that report their flows weekly also saw strong inflows to the tune of $324 million. This represented a decrease from the $636 million of inflows they reported the week before.

High-yield muni funds reported solid inflows for the week. Flows have been positive for 49 of the previous 53 weeks.

High-yield funds that report weekly saw $125 million in inflows, Lipper said. The previous week, they reported $253 million in inflows.

Assets for high-yield funds that report their flows weekly increased to almost $44.60 billion, up from $44.21 billion the week before.

The value of the holdings for weekly reporting high-yield funds increased by $263 million. Last week, they increased by almost $200 million.

The four-week moving average for all high-yield municipal bond funds that report their flows weekly was $185 million of inflows, climbing from $133 million the week before.

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