Risk Exodus Gets Real With Biggest Fund Redemptions in 6 Months

  • Bond funds post twenty-second consecutive week of inflows
  • Equities, high-yield and EM funds all have withdrawals

A pedestrian passes the New York Stock Exchange.

Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
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An exodus from risk assets started in earnest as investors pulled billions of dollars from junk bonds and emerging markets.

A standoff over nuclear weapons between the U.S. and North Korea and racial violence in the American south triggered the biggest outflows from high-yield bond funds in almost six months and emerging markets saw their first outflow in 22 weeks, Bank of America Merrill Lynch strategists wrote in a note, citing EPFR Global data for the week ending Aug. 16.