Investors continued to favour fixed income investments and retreat from equities, data from EPFR Global showed on Friday. US equity funds showed a third consecutive week of redemptions, with investors pulling $297 million from domestic stock funds, according to the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based fund tracker.
Outflows were seen from most categories of equity funds, with developed Europe seeing outflows of $1.15 billion, the largest for the week ended April 4. Asia ex-Japan showed an outflow of $716 million and Japan funds had outflows of $382 million.
Meanwhile, US bond funds posted inflows of $2.74 billion as world equities markets have faltered of late due to a re-emergence of concerns about the euro zone debt crisis. Emerging market debt funds saw inflows of $507 million.
High-yield funds posted an 18th straight week of inflows at $597 million. Among the BRIC nations - Brazil, Russia, India and China - only Russia posted inflows, with $16 million. Latin American equity funds saw inflows of $374 million for the week.
Money market funds continue to shed assets, with an outflow of $14.73 billion in the most recent week.
Global Emerging Markets (GEM) equity funds, which are free to invest across all emerging market regions, had inflows of $1.18 billion, an increase from the previous week's flows of $654 million.