Australian investors have turned negative on equities for the first time since the onset of the pandemic. Although investors continued to subscribe to managed equity funds in April and May, by June, sentiment had turned sharply negative. June saw them pull A$253m from their holdings.
Key highlights from this quarter's FFI:
- Managed equity funds suffered A$253m of outflows in June in sharp reversal of sentiment
- Investors were negative on every category of equity fund in June, except Australia
- Australian equities – protected by the sector mix on the ASX 200 – were the only category to see inflows in June
- Q2 overall saw inflows to equity funds fall to the lowest since Q1 2020 when the pandemic struck
- Fixed income funds saw record outflows in Q2, with particular weakness in June
- Across all asset classes, Q2 outflows of A$2.05bn were the largest since at least 2019, when Calastone’s Fund Flow Index record began