Investors stage largest two-week retreat from US stocks since July

Investors pulled nearly net $7.5 billion out of mutual funds and exchange-traded funds that hold US stocks last week, capping the largest two-week retreat from the domestic stock market since July 2018, according to data released on Wednesday by the Investment Company Institute. The move away from the US stock market came as the benchmark S&P 500 index finished its strongest first quarter of the year since 1998, according to Refinitiv data. For the year to date, the S&P 500 is up nearly 15.5% thanks to a combination of optimism for a trade breakthrough between the United States and China and the Federal Reserve's decision to pause its series of interest rate hikes.
Despite that rally, investors have pulled a net of approximately $17.6 billion in assets out of US stock funds over the 13 full weeks of this year, according to ICI data. World stock funds, meanwhile, lost a net $31 million in assets, continuing a seven-week pullback on the part of investors. For the year to date, world stock funds have garnered approximately $4.2 billion in net inflows.
Bond funds brought in about net $11.3 billion last week, continuing a streak of positive inflows that has lasted over each full week of the year.