Data from Lipper suggests net sales of bond funds in Europe hit €30bn in October, making it the biggest month on record since 2002. Ten different bond fund sectors saw inflows of more than €1bn each. Bond fund assets stood at €1.7trn at the end of the month, meaning they made up 28.5% of the European industry, which is up significantly from the level of 20.2% recorded five years ago. Equity assets meanwhile have slumped over the same period from 41.1% to 34%, with asserts of €2trn. Meanwhile, overall long term fund sales hit a two-year high of €31.6bn, taking the 2012 total to the end of October to €168bn, which in turn puts the industry on track to break €200bn in long term fund sales for the full year, Lipper said. Local buyers were most active in Italy (€2.1bn in net sales), Norway (€1bn) and Sweden (€1bn), largely driven by appetite for fixed income products, Lipper said. Net sales to international buyers hit €27.2bn. Lipper said that four groups attracted sales of more than €1bn in October: Pimco (€4.2bn), BlackRock (€3.3bn, of which €2.2bn relates to ETFs), Axa (€2.9bn) and JPMorgan (€1.3bn).

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