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MARKET CORRECTION DIDN'T DISSUADE BOFA CLIENTS FROM BUYING

BofA Securities equity and quant strategist Jill Carey Hall says that last week, with the S&P 500 index .SPX falling 2.3%, and entering correction territory, clients bought U.S. equities (+$3.1B) for a seventh week in a row.

"Private & institutional clients were buyers (for the 14th straight week and first time in three weeks, respectively). This is the longest start-of-year buying streak by private clients in our data since '08, but for the last five weeks they shifted to selling single stocks vs. still buying ETFs," writes Hall in her note.

She adds that hedge fund clients sold equities for the fifth week in a row.

Corporate client buybacks ramped up, but have been tracking below typical seasonal levels for the second week after elevated buybacks for much of January and February.

Hall says clients bought stocks in nine of the 11 GICS sectors, led by energy, tech and industrials.

Clients sold communication services and staples stocks. Despite concerns over the health of the U.S. consumer, discretionary stocks saw inflows for the first time in three weeks.

Hall noted that in aggregate there were larger inflows into cyclical than defensive sectors, suggesting that clients weren't positioning for recession. A recession is also not BofA's house view.

Regarding ETFs, Hall said clients bought equity ETFs across all styles (growth/blend/value) and most sizes (large/mid/broad market). However, small Cap ETFs saw their biggest outflow since July 2022.

Meanwhile, there were ETF inflows in eight of the 11 sectors, led by financials and consumer discretionary ETFs.

Healthcare and communication services ETFs experienced the biggest outflows.

(Terence Gabriel)

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