Commodity ETF Flows: Investors Exit Agricultural And Energy Funds, Pile Into Precious Metals

By Hard Assets Investor: After two-straight weeks where commodity-related exchange-traded products saw positive inflows across all asset classes, the investment tide changed course this week ending Thursday, with $425 million in net outflows.

By Hard Assets Investor: Overall inflows to commodity funds rebound from prior week’s drop-off, but the yellow metal’s price correction undercuts performance. Positive inflows of investor capital returned to commodity-related exchange-traded products this past week ending Thursday, largely thanks to precious metals.

By Hard Assets Investor: Energy sees the largest inflow in an overall positive week, but natural gas funds see price weakness.

By Hard Assets Investor: Investors retreated from commodity-related exchange-traded funds this past week, ending with a total of $955 million in outflows that touched every sector. Energy funds lost $772.6 million last week, followed by broad market (multicommodity) funds, with $67 million in outflows, precious metals with $46 million, agriculture lost $43 million in flows and industrial metals recorded $28 million in outflows.

By Hard Assets Investor: by Sumit Roy It was a slow week for ETP flows, but investors remained interested in precious metals. It was an uneventful week for commodity-related exchange-traded product flows, as every sector saw only fractional movements.Precious metals and broad market (multicommodity) ETPs had inflows of $70 million and $31 million, respectively. Agriculture, energy and industrial metals ETPs had outflows of $66 million, $62 million and $4 million, respectively.

By Hard Assets Investor: by Sumit Roy Investors add to holdings of GLD, USO and UNG.

By Hard Assets Investor: By Sumit Roy Note: This week, ETF Flows focuses on year-end results for 2011. However, the weekly ETF flows charts appear at the bottom of the story. Next week we will return to our weekly snapshot.

By Hard Assets Investor: By Sumit Roy All large precious metals ETPs saw substantial inflows over past week, but grains ETPs performed best.