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BOFA PRIVATE CLIENTS ON A RECORD BUYING STREAK

BofA Securities equity and quant strategist Jill Carey Hall says that last week, with the S&P 500 index .SPX rallying 2.9%, clients were net buyers of U.S. equities (+$4.5 billion) for a second consecutive week.

Clients bought both single stocks and ETFs, and in the wake of inflows across all size segments the prior week, clients offloaded mid caps, but continued to snap up large- and small- caps.

"Private & institutional clients were buyers (also the case the prior week) while hedge fund clients were sellers for a fourth straight week. Cumulative sales by hedge funds YTD are the largest of any comparable YTD period in our history since '08," writes Hall in her note.

Hall adds that "private clients have been buyers for 21 weeks straight (longest buying streak in our data history since '08), with inflows into both ETFs and stocks YTD (and stock inflows in 8 of 11 sectors)."

Corporate client buybacks picked up week-over-week and are tracking above typical seasonal levels for the fifth straight week.

Hall says that clients bought stocks in 10 of 11 GICS sectors, with only utilities experiencing outflows.

Buying was led by tech and healthcare, while materials continues to have the longest recent buying streak at 10 weeks.

In terms of ETFs, Hall says that clients bought equity ETFs for a second week in a row. They bought ETFs across all styles and sizes for the first time in seven weeks.

Meanwhile, seven sectors saw ETF outflows, led by energy, tech, and materials ETFs. Of note, energy ETFs have seen the biggest cumulative outflows of the sectors YTD.

Healthcare ETFs saw the largest inflows last week.

(Terence Gabriel)

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