Press Release

INVESTMENT FUND STATISTICS - November 2007

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Friday 21 December 2007

INVESTMENT FUND STATISTICS
November 2007

 

Summary	UK Domiciled	Overseas Domiciled
Funds under Management	£ 462.3 billion (November 2006 £398.7 billion)	£17.7 billion (November 2006 £11.6 billion)
Net retail sales	-£333 million (November 2006 £600.6 million)	-£176 million (November 2006 £40.5 million)
Net ISA sales	-£50 million (November 2006 -£3.1 million)	-£1.2 million (November 2006 £1.9 million)

UK Domiciled funds

Funds under management 
Funds under management of UK domiciled investment funds were £462.3 billion in November, a fall of 4% from October but 16% higher than November 2006¹. UK domiciled ISA funds under management of £53.7 billion were down 4% from the previous month and 7% higher than the previous year.

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^{1. The increase in funds under management is mainly due to the inclusion of additional institutional funds from January 2007.  The total FUM for November 2007 would have been £433 billion without these funds, an increase of 9% from November 2006.}   

Graph showing UK domiciled funds under management since November 2006

ISA sales 
Net sales of UK domiciled investment fund ISAs saw outflows of £50 million in November, higher than the previous month's outflows of £31.4 million.

The most popular UK domiciled ISA sector in November 2007 was UK All Companies, accounting for 25% of gross ISA sales.  In net terms the most popular ISA sector was Cautious Managed.

UK domiciled net sales by asset class 
Of the £333 million outflows in net retail sales, equities saw the largest outflow of £606 million; this includes £253 million outflows from property funds in the specialist sector.  Balanced funds were the most popular asset class accounting for inflows of £169 million, of which £150 million went into the Cautious Managed sector. Institutional holdings of unit trusts and OEICs saw outflows of £891 million with money market funds accounting for inflows of £155 million.  Including institutional sales, the net outflow from property funds was £494 million, or 3.6% of total property funds under management.

Graph showing net retail sales of UK domiciled funds over the last 13 months

Gross retail sales by sector and distribution channel
The most popular sector in November was UK All Companies, representing 17% of gross retail sales of UK domiciled funds. 80% of gross retail sales into the UK All Companies sector were via the intermediary channel.

The most popular distribution channel for UK domiciled funds in November was the intermediary channel, representing 87% of gross retail business. Gross ISA sales of £253 million through fund supermarkets made them the dominant distributor of ISAs, followed by £190 million from sales force/tied agents.

Best selling sector for UK domiciled funds 
The Cautious Managed sector was the most popular UK domiciled net retail sector with inflows of £150 million.  The sector with the biggest outflows in November was the Europe Excluding UK sector with net retail outflows of £195 million. 

OVERSEAS FUNDS

Overseas funds under management of £17.7 billion in November saw a 4% decrease from the previous month and overseas ISA assets of £334 million fell 5% from October 2007.

Net retail sales of overseas domiciled funds in November saw outflows of £176 million. Net retail sales of overseas domiciled investment fund ISAs saw outflows of £1.2 million in November, a drop from the previous month's inflows of £3.1million.

Summary of overseas domiciled funds - FUM and sales 

Richard Saunders, Chief Executive of the IMA commented:

"November saw record retail outflows, with investors redeeming holdings in property, equities and bonds.  The negative trend was also evident in sales of non-UK funds and ISAs. But money market and balanced funds benefited from this mood of caution."