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Faith Falters in S&P 500 as $17 Billion Outflow Precedes Selloff

A man sits on the steps of Federal Hall across from the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., on Friday, Sept. 26, 2014. The S&P 500 finished the quarter below its average price for the past 50 days after dropping under that level for the first time since August on Sept. 25. — A man sits on the steps of Federal Hall across from the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., on Friday, Sept. 26, 2014. The S&P 500 finished the quarter below its average price for the past 50 days after dropping under that level for the first time since August on Sept. 25.
Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg

Lu Wang and Joseph Ciolli

March 5, 2015, 5:00 AM UTCUpdated onMarch 5, 2015, 9:08 PM UTC

More than 50 record closes for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index in the last year are proving too little to keep investors interested.

They’ve pulled $16.8 billion from exchange-traded funds tracking American equities in 2015 and sent $16.9 billion to bonds, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the biggest divergence ever in quarterly data going back to 2000.