LIVE MARKETS-BofA clients have a strong appetite for financials

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BOFA CLIENTS HAVE A STRONG APPETITE FOR FINANCIALS

BofA Securities equity and quant strategist Jill Carey Hall says that last week, with the S&P 500 index .SPX dipping around 0.2%, clients were net buyers of U.S. equities (+$3.6B) for a second-straight week.

Clients bought single stocks for the fifth-straight week, but also snapped up ETFs for the first time in five weeks.

"Private clients and hedge funds were net buyers for the 9th consecutive week and first time in nine weeks, respectively," writes Hall in her note.

She adds that corporate client buybacks as a percentage of S&P 500 market cap were at a near-record weekly level last week (13th largest in BofA's data history since 2010) after a record January for buybacks.

In terms of S&P 500 groups, Hall says clients bought stocks in seven of the 11 GICS sectors, led by post-Financial Crisis record inflows into financials.

Tech, communication services and energy stocks also saw large inflows, and clients have now been net buyers of energy for the last six weeks after outflows most weeks since July.

Industrials suffered the largest outflows for second week in a row. Clients also offloaded healthcare, utilities and consumer discretionary stocks.

As for ETFs, Hall said clients bought large-cap ETFs and value ETFs last week, but sold growth/blend and small/mid/broad market ETFs.

Six of the 11 sectors saw ETF inflows, led by tech and staples ETFs, while healthcare and communication services ETFs saw the biggest outflows.

(Terence Gabriel)

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