Investors flee US equity funds on escalating tariff concerns

(Reuters) -U.S. equity funds saw outflows in the week ending April 2 as investors shed risky assets on growing concerns that President Donald Trump's sweeping trade tariffs could drive up costs, pressure corporate profits and heighten recession risks.

U.S. investors divested a net $10.85 billion worth of equity funds during the week although less than a half compared with $22.89 billion worth of net accumulations in the prior week.

Major Wall Street indexes dropped over 4% on Thursday as Trump introduced sweeping reciprocal tariffs on trading partners, escalating a trade war and intensifying fears of an economic slowdown.

U.S. small-cap funds saw significant outflows of $4.18 billion, reversing $3.07 billion in inflows from the prior week. Large-cap and mid-cap funds also faced net sales of $2.9 billion and $461 million, respectively.

Sectoral funds recorded their fifth consecutive week of outflows, totaling $2.45 billion. Investors pulled $1.69 billion from tech funds, $1.18 billion from consumer discretionary funds, and $860 million from healthcare funds.

Meanwhile, safe-haven demand drove inflows into money market funds, which attracted a net $22.01 billion, marking a second straight week of gains. U.S. bond funds experienced $1.73 billion in net sales, extending their streak of net outflows to a third consecutive week.

Investors divested $1.03 billion from U.S. general domestic taxable fixed-income funds and $864 million from short-to-intermediate investment-grade funds, while allocating a net $1.53 billion to short-to-intermediate government and treasury funds.

(Reporting by Gaurav Dogra and Patturaja Murugaboopathy in Bengaluru; editing by David Evans)