Stone Fox Capital's  Instablog

Typical herd mentality for investors to be piling into bond funds at record low interest rates. They did it in 2000 with tech stocks. They did it in 2006-07 with real estate on the coasts and now bonds.

ICI reported that total equity funds had a $1.4B outflow last week and over $12B for the last five weeks. The positive news is that bond funds had a lot more money flow into them leaving the weekly net increase of nearly $6B. When the market turns it could be sudden and dramatic.
Until then though, it'll be difficult to gain much ground with dry powder held by institutions such as mutual funds continually sucked out.

	7/14/2010	7/21/2010	7/28/2010	8/4/2010	8/11/2010
Total Equity	-3,192	-1,157	-4,074	-2,201	-1,427
	Domestic	-3,235	-1,402	-4,296	-2,122	-2,073
	Foreign	43	246	222	-79	646
Hybrid	430	370	69	233	213
Total Bond	6,138	7,931	7,099	7,551	7,169
	Taxable	5,200	6,944	6,112	6,350	5,788
	Municipal	937	987	987	1,201	1,382
Total	3,376	7,144	3,094	5,583	5,955

On a very bright note, Intel (INTC) agreed to buy McAfee (MFE) for nearly $8B in cash. Though the 58% premium did nothing for the market today though it should've lit a fire under valuations, the deal will eventually lead to an $8B cash inflow to stock funds. Such deals do provide cash inflows for the market. Since corporations are flush with cash, they could provide the support needed as individuals continue to leave at the wrong time.


Disclosure: No positions