Long-term US fund flows notched their seventh straight month of inflows in November, collectively raking in a net $80 billion. In a volatile month, investors appeared affected by rate-cutting expectations, as well as uncertainty around the artificial intelligence stock trade. Consistent with the past several months, flows favored taxable bonds, especially lower-risk areas within it, as well as international stocks over US equities. That said, US equity funds broke a six-month streak of outflows, tech sector funds posted their first outflows since April, and crypto assets lost some allure.
Taxable-bond funds continued to rake in assets in November, with 22 of 27 categories gathering assets amid a rate-cutting cycle. Their $51 billion of inflows marked a seventh straight month of inflows above $50 billion. In the past three years, total net assets in taxable-bond funds increased 38%. Much of that growth in 2025 was attributable to less-risky categories such as intermediate-core bond, ultrashort bond, and short-term bond. Investors favored shorter bonds in November as the US yield curve continued to steepen, as persistent long-term inflation concerns remained.
US equity funds gathered a scant $3.4 billion in November, good enough to reverse a six-month streak of outflows. Yet, durable category trends persisted; large-blend funds’ $18 billion in inflows led categories within the group, with the three largest outflows going to the growth categories. Passive inflows dominated, especially to large-blend stalwarts. But investors also gave thanks for large value, blessing the category with nearly $3 billion of inflows and especially the iShares S&P 500 Value ETF IVE, whose $4 billion in inflows was its largest on record, a monthly organic growth rate of nearly 10%.
International-equity funds stayed in the green in November, booking their seventh consecutive monthly inflows, which, at $16.2 billion, edged the similarly sized June inflows to become its largest in more than three years. Foreign large-blend led international categories with an $11 billion net addition of mostly passive assets, but diversified emerging markets made a strong showing — second place at nearly $6 billion. That was emerging market’s largest inflows since March 2022 and was unsurprisingly driven by passive, as well.
Sector-equity funds saw a minor $750 million in outflows in November, reversing a six-month streak of inflows worth more than $40 billion in new assets. In fact, the entire group seemed upside-down, with health funds attracting more than $3 billion in the month — a start to plug the $72 billion hole left from outflows since December 2022. Conversely, technology funds saw small outflows after an otherwise successful 2025, with net inflows of $21 billion so far. Equity digital assets funds — mostly blockchain-oriented strategies — similarly saw an unusual loss; that category has grown its assets by more than 40% over the past year.
A widely held risk-off sentiment that helped drive fund flows for months, particularly within equity, seems to have reversed in November, at least to an extent. Leveraged equity funds brought in $6.4 billion in November, their second-largest monthly inflow on record. This came after six straight months of significant outflows. Conversely, inverse equity funds, which profit from equity market declines, lost $1.6 billion, their first outflows since February 2025 and the fifth-largest on record. Investors may have had enough of sitting on the sidelines, as equity markets have continued to rise.’
Digital assets funds did not fare well in November, notching their largest monthly outflows on record of $3.2 billion. While this absolute value was surely affected by crypto’s exponential growth in recent years, November’s organic growth rate of negative 1.7% was its lowest on record as well. Bitcoin and ethereum funds dominate the digital assets category, and in November, these two lost approximately 17% and 21% of their values, respectively. Considering both outflows and crypto price drops, the digital assets category shrunk by over 20%, down to $153 billion.
