RRSP season "ended with a whimper," according to a UBS report that showed March mutual fund inflows rebounding strongly from a year earlier but still at less than half the average for the month recorded over the past fifteen years.
Nevertheless, mutual fund assets under management rose to $618 billion in March as Canadians channelled money into balanced funds and fixed income investments, the Investment Funds Institute of ÎÚÑ»´«Ã½ reported yesterday.
It was the first time since August 2008 that assets have been above the $600-million mark, the industry group said.
Net inflows for March totalled $1.64 billion, after investors purchased $3.96 billion in long-term funds and sold $2.32 billion in money market funds.
It was the twelfth consecutive month of rising inflows for long-term mutual funds, according to UBS Investment Research strategist George Vasic.
Yet as he wrote in a research note: "This is a significant improvement over the $520 million inflow a year earlier, but still only 46 per cent of the 1995-2009 average."
Balanced funds continued to be Canadians "asset class of choice" with net sales of $3.4 billion, Vasic said.
Conversely, Canadians also continued to pull out of money market funds, posting net redemptions of $2.321 billion as the fears sown by the financial crisis of 2008 continued to fade.
Equity fund redemptions totalled $502.6 million, including $81 million in redemptions of domestic equity funds.
Bond funds, meanwhile, attracted $1.04 billion in net inflows while balanced funds attracted $3.394 billion in net inflows.
