These mutual fund classes were hot in November

Investors continue to put more money into long-term mutual funds and ETFs while redeeming money market funds, according to Investment Funds Institute of Canada data released Monday.

Mutual fund assets overall remained over $2 trillion: IFIC reported a 0.2% increase in mutual fund net assets to $2.034 trillion in November from $2.031 trillion in October. 

Total mutual fund net sales were $7.5 billion in November, up by 34% from $5.6 billion in October and up by 20.5% from $6.2 billion year over year.

Net sales in long-term funds overall were just under $8 billion in November, up by 33% from October. Meanwhile, net assets in long-term funds increased by only about $4 billion month over month, settling at $2 trillion.

Net sales were up in three of the four long-term mutual fund categories. Bond fund net sales were $630 million in November, up by 69% from $370 million in October. Balanced fund net sales rose by 38% to $4.4 billion in November from $3.3 billion in October, while equity fund net sales rose by 36% to $2.6 billion in November from $1.9 billion in October. In specialty funds, net sales dropped by 3% to $418 million in November from $431 million in October.

Redemptions in money market funds were $503 million in November, up by 23% from October. IFIC recorded $7.6 billion in redemptions of money market mutual funds year to date. 

As for ETFs, net assets stood at $335.9 billion in November, up by 1.2% from $331.9 billion in October and by 34.3% from $250.1 billion in November 2020.

Net ETF sales were $5.1 billion last month, compared to $4.4 billion in October and $3.2 billion in November 2020, with equities ETFs leading the way in November at $3.9 billion in net sales.

Similar to their mutual fund counterparts, money market ETFs saw net redemptions in November ($106 million), bringing year-to-date redemptions to $967 million.