Mom And Pops Said See Ya

Investors pulled $23.5 billion from equity mutual funds during the week of the S&P downgrade. As others blamed high frequency trading the Monday following  the S&P downgrade I wrote:

My best guess as to what is occurring today is that retail investors are just getting out. The media got everybody worked up about the S&P downgrade and combined with the recent decline it put mom and pops over the top. They simply don’t want to go through another 2008.

The fact that mutual fund investors pulled that much money while insiders and billionaires were buying has bullish medium term implications but little short term implications.