by Dan SondhelmMorningstar has just confirmed that its monthly fund flow data and industry trends will be made available to the media and mutual fund executives at no charge. Until now, Morningstar provided this information only to its proprietary email list of journalists, according to an interview with Carling Spelhaug, spokesperson for Morningstar. “We see growing interest in our information from various audiences. That’s why we now are issuing a press release with a link to the full report to make it more widely available.”
The Chicago-based research firm is filling an information need for industry professionals that disappeared in mid-2008 when Boston-based Financial Research Corporation announced it would no longer provide this information at no charge, although it still provides a high level overview of trends to the media. FRC, along with NY-based Strategic Insight, requires a paid subscription and special report fees for the details.
This is good news for smaller firms who can again use this type of industry information to assess their marketability and make smart decisions. One of the benefits of being a smaller fund firm is the ability to focus on just a few good strategies. However, if your focus is on an asset class that hasn't seen positive flows for awhile, it may be time to accept the fund's small size, commit to waiting it out until your style is back in favor, promote another fund in your family instead, or close it.
In addition, you can easily find out how similar funds are faring in terms of flows. If you have a fund that looks good versus its peers, but you aren't getting your share of flows, you may want to analyze what may be lacking in your product or distribution strategy.
Today’s report from Morningstar featured the U.S. mutual fund and ETF asset flows year-to-date through October:
- Total inflows into U.S. mutual funds reached $314.1 billion, far surpassing the $154.2 billion that investors pulled out of the market in 2008, with $40.3 million in inflows occurring during October. ETFs continued to attract assets in October.
-Overall, ETFs saw slightly more than $8.0 billion in net inflows for the month, bringing the year-to-date total net inflows to $63.9 billion.
-Industry-wide, assets under management as of Oct. 31, 2009 fell to $699.2 billion, down slightly from the previous month because of market performance.
The Chicago-based research firm is filling an information need for industry professionals that disappeared in mid-2008 when Boston-based Financial Research Corporation announced it would no longer provide this information at no charge, although it still provides a high level overview of trends to the media. FRC, along with NY-based Strategic Insight, requires a paid subscription and special report fees for the details.
This is good news for smaller firms who can again use this type of industry information to assess their marketability and make smart decisions. One of the benefits of being a smaller fund firm is the ability to focus on just a few good strategies. However, if your focus is on an asset class that hasn't seen positive flows for awhile, it may be time to accept the fund's small size, commit to waiting it out until your style is back in favor, promote another fund in your family instead, or close it.
In addition, you can easily find out how similar funds are faring in terms of flows. If you have a fund that looks good versus its peers, but you aren't getting your share of flows, you may want to analyze what may be lacking in your product or distribution strategy.
Today’s report from Morningstar featured the U.S. mutual fund and ETF asset flows year-to-date through October:
- Total inflows into U.S. mutual funds reached $314.1 billion, far surpassing the $154.2 billion that investors pulled out of the market in 2008, with $40.3 million in inflows occurring during October. ETFs continued to attract assets in October.
-Overall, ETFs saw slightly more than $8.0 billion in net inflows for the month, bringing the year-to-date total net inflows to $63.9 billion.
-Industry-wide, assets under management as of Oct. 31, 2009 fell to $699.2 billion, down slightly from the previous month because of market performance.
Additional highlights from the report on mutual funds:
-Dimensional Fund Advisors topped the list of firms with the greatest inflows, while American Funds remains the only firm among the largest five fund families to have outflows year-to-date.
-U.S. equity funds saw outflows of $8.1 billion in October, marking the second straight month that U.S. stock funds lost assets while bond funds gained assets. Large-growth and large-value funds experienced the largest declines.
-International equities have stopped bleeding and are now in positive territory. The group, bolstered by flows into world-allocation and diversified emerging markets, gathered $5.1 billion in assets in October.
To view the complete report, please visit http://www.global.morningstar.com/octflows09.
-Dimensional Fund Advisors topped the list of firms with the greatest inflows, while American Funds remains the only firm among the largest five fund families to have outflows year-to-date.
-U.S. equity funds saw outflows of $8.1 billion in October, marking the second straight month that U.S. stock funds lost assets while bond funds gained assets. Large-growth and large-value funds experienced the largest declines.
-International equities have stopped bleeding and are now in positive territory. The group, bolstered by flows into world-allocation and diversified emerging markets, gathered $5.1 billion in assets in October.
To view the complete report, please visit http://www.global.morningstar.com/octflows09.
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