LONDON, June 9 (Reuters) - Rising cases in Britain of the
Delta variant of COVID-19 first detected in India discouraged
investors from buying UK-focused equity funds in May, data from
fund network Calastone showed on Wednesday.
Flows into UK equity funds slowed to 147 million pounds
($208 million) from 335 million pounds in April and 572 million
in March, with inflows switching to outflows from the middle of
May as infection rates rose, Calastone said in a statement.
The drop-off in enthusiasm came after "a lot of hope has
been baked into UK-focused equity funds since the end of January
as the rapid vaccine rollout raised hopes of release from COVID
restrictions", said Edward Glyn, head of global markets at
Calastone.
Investors also ditched real estate funds due to the
uncertainty, with the sector seeing outflows of 445 million
pounds in May, the second-worst on record.
British insurer Aviva in May said it would close
three UK property funds which had been frozen since March 2020
due to market turmoil caused by the pandemic.
More than two-thirds of UK-based fund flows by value pass
across the Calastone network each month.
($1 = 0.7078 pounds)
(Reporting by Carolyn Cohn
Editing by Bernadette Baum)
Aviva (AV.)