August was a strong month for equity funds, with inflows rising to £1.3bn. Since the sea change in sentiment towards equity funds that accompanied the announcement of successful clinical trials of Pfizer’s, Moderna’s and AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccines in November 2020, investors have added £17.2bn to their equity holdings. This means more than a third of the net inflows to equity funds (35%) since 2015 has taken place in the last ten months alone.
Key highlights from this month's FFI:
- Since vaccine approvals in Nov 20, equity funds have seen £17bn of inflows
- This is one third of all new capital to equity funds since 2015
- Passive fund flows have lagged behind active funds in nine of the last ten months – they saw inflows of just £4m in August, compared to £1.3bn for active funds
- Vaccine approvals also proved a key turning point for active funds
- Even after stripping out ESG funds, big drivers of active strategies, traditional active funds have seen more new capital than index trackers since November 2020