Investors have stepped back into the U.S. market, picking up broad stock exchange traded funds for the sixth straight week.
U.S. stock ETFs attracted $3.5 billion last week and saw their sixth straight week of net cash inflows, reports Trevor Hunnicutt for Reuters.
“ETF investors have fueled the bull market since the end of February,” Jeff Tjornehoj, Lipper’s head of Americas research, told Reuters.
Investor inflows largely targeted ETFs invested in U.S.-based companies, which brought in $2.3 billion in net inflows following two weeks of outflows. For example, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (NYSEArca: SPY) attracted almost $3 billion over the past week.
“They did like technology and utilities, which is an odd combination because utilities are a defensive play and technology is an aggressive one,” Tjornehoj added.
U.S. technology funds brought in $767 million for the week while utilities sector funds added $485 million, according to Lipper. The Technology Select Sector SPDR (NYSEArca: XLK) added $545.1 million and the Utilities Select Sector SPDR (NYSEArca: XLU) attracted $245.7 million over the past week, according to ETF.com.
Meanwhile, international ETFs saw $888 million in inflows and taxable bond funds saw $818 million in inflows, according to Lipper data.