According to CNN, annual inflation dropped in March 2023 for the ninth consecutive month, and grocery prices fell month-on-month for the first time since September 2020. While the CPI has cooled off – at least temporarily – investors are not treating the news as a green light for the road back to riskier asset classes. With fear far from banished, cash remains king.
With mud season keeping the conflict in Ukraine deadlocked and the next round of major central bank meetings still a fortnight away, investors turned their attention to taxes, corporate earnings and China’s economy during the third week of April.
Kirsten Longbottom, Research Associate at EPFR, is in charge of delivering our fund flows highlights this week. Using our Fund Flows and Allocations data and insights, we put our focus on equity flows and sector allocations.
The second week of April offered investors two data points, the latest US jobs report and the inflation numbers for Match, that they hoped would make the case for a pause in the Federal Reserve’s tightening cycle. Although headline inflation in March came in at a one-year low and the number of new non-farm jobs created was the least in over two years, investors were left hoping that the Fed will focus on the trends rather than the actual, positive numbers.
In the face of this uncertainty, and the unwillingness of major Western central banks to suspend the battle against inflation, investors continued to cut risk, increase their exposure to China’s rebound story and steer cash into liquidity funds.
