August sales of investment funds followed ETFs downwards, with outflows from active funds.
Data from Morningstar showed August sales “slowed down considerably” after strong demand in preceding months, but were still positive with €37.7 billion of net subscriptions to open-ended funds in Europe.
Morningstar recently said the ETF sales in August had also slowed considerably.
Flows into equity funds dropped most significantly, from €17.7 billion in July, to €2.7 billion in August. Actively managed equity funds suffered outflows for the first month since March.
Similarly, demand for passive equity funds was also down significantly to €3.2 billion. This followed a stronger June and July with net sales of €20.4 billion in June, though falling to €4.5 billion in July.
Morningstar said the figures showed the structural shift from active to passive equity funds continuing, although not at the pace of 2016 when net €87.5 billion exited from active equity funds.
Passive equity funds, including ETFs, had a market share of 26.3% of assets under management in open-end equity funds.
The firms also said Pimco’s GIS Income fund had set a record for assets under management in open-ended European funds, with assets of €45.6 billion.
Ali Masarwah, regional editorial director at Morningstar, said: “For the year to date, this flexible-bond fund has accounted for 75% of inflows to Pimco’s European open-end fund range. This was even more extreme last month when this flexible-bond fund accounted for more than 90% of all Pimco Europe inflows.”
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