The European Fund and Asset Management Association’s (EFAMA) latest monthly Industry Fact Sheet, which provides an overview of the net sales and net assets of investment funds domiciled in Europe at month end, was published on 23 November 2015. The data used is gathered from 27 different national associations which reportedly represent more than 99 per cent of total UCITS and AIF assets in Europe.

Increase in net sales of long-term UCITS

The statistics show that September saw a decrease in net sales of UCITS to 1 billion euro, down from 9 billion euro in August, which in itself had represented a significant decline following sales of 63 billion euro in July.

However, EFAMA attributed the decrease in September to net outflows from money market funds, which experienced net outflows of 11 billion euro in September, a substantial reduction from the net inflows of 12 billion euro in August. EFAMA states that these net outflows reflect usual end-of-quarter redemptions.

In contrast, long-term UCITS (UCITS excluding money market funds) recorded an increase in net sales from 3 billion euro in August to 12 billion euro in September. The Director for Economics and Research at EFAMA, Bernard Delbecque, believes this suggests investor confidence began to strengthen again in September after a few weeks of market turbulence.

Likewise, net sales figures of AIFs also saw net outflows of 11 billion euro following inflows of 6 billion euro in August.

The total net assets of the European investment fund industry fell by 2.3 per cent in the month of September to 12,109 billion.

Click here for a link to the Investment Funds Industry Fact Sheet for September 2015. To view EFAMA’s press release in relation to the fact sheet, click here.

Contributed by Niall Crowley