No rate cut, no stocks? BofA warns: over $160 billion poured into money market funds in a single week

Odaily reports that Bank of America strategist Michael Hartnett said money market funds attracted $166.4 billion in inflows in the week ending October 7, the largest weekly scale since April 2020. He believes that as long as the Federal Reserve does not initiate sustained and significant monetary easing, this batch of funds will find it difficult to leave cash-like assets on a large scale in the short term. Hartnett summed up the current logic of capital flows in one sentence: "No rate cut, no reduction in cash."

Unlike the common previous judgment that "too much cash will eventually flow into the stock market," he believes that the current elevated level of cash does not necessarily mean there will be massive potential buying power for stocks in the future, because cash itself can already provide relatively attractive yields. The market now expects that the Fed's next rate hike is more likely to occur in December rather than at the late-October meeting. The rates market is also pricing in the possibility of continued tightening in the coming months. In this environment, cash is no longer a "waiting asset" with almost no yield.

Money market funds and short-term bonds can provide relatively high interest while price volatility is significantly lower than that of stocks and long-term bonds, so investors have no obvious incentive to rush into taking on more risk.