Source: FRED: WRMFNS (ICI / Federal Reserve H.6 release)
Data through: Aug 31, 2026 · updated Sep 23 · Updates: Monthly · Next: Oct 27
WThe three bars show the last 3 weeks for this indicator, oldest left to newest right. Bar height reflects each reading relative to the other two — the tallest is the highest of the three, the shortest the lowest.
↑ 5.5% YoY
Historical context: Currently in the 40th percentile of all historical readings.
What this means right now: Retail money fund assets are growing at their usual pace — no sign of a flight to safety in the flow.
Money Market Fund Assets · Weekly · 1980–2026
NBER recessions
Scroll to read · zoom and pan in Expand
Monthly values
Money Market Fund Assets — the last 12 months
Every month's reading, with the band the heatmap gives it. The chart above shows the same series in full.
Month
Value
Band
Aug 2026
+5.5% YoY
Within normal range
Jul 2026
+6.0% YoY
Within normal range
Jun 2026
+6.7% YoY
Within normal range
May 2026
+7.8% YoY
Within normal range
Apr 2026
+7.9% YoY
Within normal range
Mar 2026
+8.7% YoY
Within normal range
Month-end readings of the same series the chart shows, from money_market_assets_yoy_52w. Values are the current record, not point-in-time: a month that has since been revised shows its revised value.
What is the Money Market Assets?
This tracks retail money market fund assets (FRED WRMFNS, about $3.03T) — short-term, highly liquid cash-equivalent holdings (government securities, commercial paper, repo). Retail money fund assets grow year after year: the median year since 1981 has seen growth of about 10%. So the level sits near a record high about 2 weeks in 3 (through August 2026) and says little on its own. The read here is the year-over-year rate of change.
Surging inflows (a high positive yearly change) are a flight to safety — cash leaving risk assets for near-cash holdings during stress, as in the 2023 rate-hike and regional-bank crisis and COVID in 2020. Outflows or slowing growth (a low or negative yearly change) go with returning risk appetite — cash rotating back into equities and bonds, as in the post-crisis zero-rate years. The level sits near its high, as it has in about 2 weeks in 3 since 1980 (1,566 of 2,431 within a tenth of the prior high, through August 2026) — which is why the yearly change, not the level, is what this page reads.
Series note: this indicator uses FRED WRMFNS, the weekly retail money fund series without seasonal adjustment. The Fed discontinued the seasonally adjusted weekly series (WRMFSL) in February 2021, and WRMFNS is the continuing one.
How We Color-Code the Money Market Assets
Our heatmap colors this indicator against historically significant thresholds:
Below −3.8%
Outflows — cash leaving money funds as rates fall or risk appetite returns (the bottom fifth of the 1981–2026 record).
−3.8% – 5.5%
Flat to slow growth — below the secular pace; stable-to-declining cash, modestly risk-on.
5.5% – 13.2%
Normal growth — the middle fifth of the record, which brackets the median year (about +10%); no sign of stress in the flow.
13.2% – 19.1%
Elevated inflows — cash building faster than its usual pace; caution rising.
Above 19.1%
Surge — the top fifth of the record: flight-to-safety (COVID 2020 ≈ +30%; the 2023 rate-hike / bank-crisis peak ≈ +42%).
Historical Extremes — What Happened Next?
When this indicator reaches extreme levels, history shows consistent patterns:
Sep 2023Rate-hike & bank-crisis surge
+42.2% YoY
The fastest Fed hiking cycle since 1981 and the March 2023 regional-bank failures drove the largest inflows since 1982 into money funds, as short-term rates passed 5%.
May 2020COVID flight-to-safety
+29.8% YoY
The pandemic shock sent investors fleeing to cash.
Mar 2010Post-GFC ZIRP outflows
−24.7% YoY
Zero rates pushed cash out of money funds — the longest outflow on record, 197 weeks below a year earlier from April 2009 to January 2013. The deepest single week remains December 1983's −26.8%.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is the signal the year-over-year change, not the level?
Retail money market fund assets grow year after year — the median year since 1981 has seen growth of about 10%. So the level is near a record high about 2 weeks in 3 (about $3.03T as of Aug 2026), and a record level carries little information. The rate of change is what shows a change of mood: surging inflows mean cash is fleeing risk assets (stress), while outflows mean cash is rotating back into markets (risk-on).
What does a surge in inflows signal?
A sharp acceleration in year-over-year growth — +42% in the 2023 rate-hike and regional-bank crisis, +30% during COVID in 2020 — is a flight to safety: cash leaving stocks and bonds for near-cash. It has come with stress, but the peak has not marked the market's turn. In 2020 the S&P 500's low came two months before the inflow peak, in 2023 a year before it, and in 2008 the fall came after. A year after the nine peaks above 20% since 1981 the index was higher in 7, about the same share as after any week.
What happens to money fund flows when the Fed cuts interest rates?
When the Fed cuts, money fund yields fall almost at once, since the funds hold short paper that reprices quickly. Cash has not reliably left on cue: after the 8 first cuts since 1984, money fund growth was slower a year later in 5 and faster in 3. It turned to outflows within two years after 3 of the 8 (2001, 2007 and 2019).
Is this retail or total money market fund assets?
This tracks RETAIL money market funds (FRED WRMFNS, about $3.03T) — not the industry total, which also includes institutional funds and which the site does not track. Retail flows are a cleaner read on household risk positioning. (The series is weekly and not seasonally adjusted; the year-over-year change removes the seasonal swing.)
What's the difference between government and prime money market funds?
Government funds hold only Treasury securities and government-backed repo — safest but lowest yield. Prime funds also hold commercial paper and certificates of deposit — slightly higher yield, slightly more credit risk. After the 2016 reforms, money moved out of prime funds into government funds, mostly among the institutional funds the reform aimed at. Government funds now hold most money-fund assets. The site's series counts retail funds of every type together, so it cannot show the split.
How are this page's color bands set?
By a five-band quintile rule: the 20th, 40th, 60th and 80th percentiles of the series' own 52-week-change history, rounded to a tenth of a percent and inverted because surging inflows mark a flight to safety. Today's color reads against the whole history, 1981 to today: the edges now are −3.8%, 5.5%, 13.2% and 19.1%. A past week's color — in the Time Machine and in the monthly table — reads against the history up to that week, as it would have read then, so the edges move a little as data arrives. A color exists once the series has ten years of history (here from 1991). Nothing is tuned to the current reading.