NEW YORK - Cash withdrawals from municipal bond mutual funds that report their flows weekly decreased to the lowest level so far in 2011, to $403.605 million for the week ended March 30.
The pared-down outflows put a cap on a month of significant cash withdrawals, including $640.373 million that exited the funds in the week ended March 23 and a recent high of $1.03 billion on March 2.
Meanwhile, the four-week moving average of cash withdrawals for all mutual funds in the $463.804 billion industry dropped to $605.207 million — also the lowest it has been in 2011 — down from $974.049 million in the week ended March 23.
With noticeable weakness plaguing the municipal market, the value of assets held by the weekly reporters dropped by $1.90 billion — up significantly from losses of only $394.450 million in the previous week. Total assets for funds that report weekly dropped to $310.565 billion in the week ended March 30, down from $312.873 billion the week before.
Municipal Market Data pushed the yield on the 10-year triple-A municipal scale up 29 basis points in the past 11 trading sessions, including four basis points on Thursday.
The weekly average yield to maturity on The Bond Buyer’s 40-bond index rose 5 basis points this week to 5.69%. The Bond Buyer’s 20-bond index rose nine basis points to 5% this week, while the 10-year Treasury yield rose only four basis points.
