As we wrote yesterday when reviewing the latest note from JPM’s Mislav Matejka, according to the JPM strategist not only had the window to buy stocks into the torrid S&P500 rebound closed, but traders should “start fading it within days” as JPM stuck “to the overriding view that one should use any strength as an opportunity to reduce equity allocation.”
Today, when reading the latest report by BofA’s equity and quant strategy team looking at what the “smart money” – institutions, hedge funds and private clients – are doing, we find that JPM’s advice was heeded, and the rally was indeed sold with reckless abandon.
From BofA:
Last week, during which the S&P 500 rallied another 1.8%, BofAML clients were net sellers of US stocks for the first time in five weeks, in the amount of $1.2bn. Net sales were led by hedge fund clients, who had previously been net buyers for the prior five weeks, while private clients and institutional clients were also net sellers. (Institutional clients have alternated between buying and selling in recent weeks, while private clients have been sellers for the last three weeks.)
Perhaps just as notable is that according to BofA, buybacks by corporate clients decelerated last week to their lowest level year-to-date, but on a four-week average basis buybacks are well above last January’s levels.
In other words, just as we suggested yesterday, much of the February buybacks expected by Goldman’s David Kostin to come to the rescue of the market, have been pulled forward into January, leaving far less dry powder available for the month of February.
What was the smart money selling?
Net sales last week were chiefly in large caps, while small caps also saw outflows; clients continued to buy mid-cap. Previously, all three size segments had seen net buying every week of 2016.
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