Investors are once again flocking to the certainty — and relatively high yields — of cash as conviction grows that the Federal Reserve will continue raising interest rates.
Nearly $572 million flooded into the $11.5 billion iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond exchange-traded fund (ticker SGOV) last week, the biggest weekly influx since the peak of March’s banking turmoil, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. At the same time, assets in money-market funds jumped to a record last week, snapping three consecutive weeks of outflows.
Appetite for the shortest-dated government debt is building once again with traders wagering that the Fed will raise rates this month — and possibly again after that — following June’s pause. That hawkish bias, combined with a dominant performance from equities and corporate debt in the first half of 2023, has investors on the cautious side ahead of another round of corporate earnings, which kicks off this Friday, according to CreditSights.
“It’s probably the combination of the melt-up in risk assets and tighter credit spreads, plus expectations that the Fed actually hikes again in July,” said Winnie Cisar, global head of credit strategy at CreditSights. “People are taking a bit of a breather trying to figure out what the next move is in the market, especially with earnings season looming.”
Cash has emerged as one of the most popular asset classes amid the central bank’s historically aggressive tightening cycle. Yields on Treasury bills are hovering near the loftiest levels in over a decade after the Fed delivered five percentage points of rate increases in a little over a year.
At the same time, demand for corporate debt is ebbing after a rally that took credit spreads to the tightest level in months. A combined $2 billion exited from the $13.1 billion iShares iBoxx High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (HYG) and the $35.4 billion iShares iBoxx $ Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF (LQD) last Thursday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
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