Mutual funds generated almost $1.2 billion in net sales for January, however, it was all due to money market funds, and particularly sales of RBC’s money funds.

The Investment Funds Institute of Canada reported that total net sales were $1.17 billion in January, up from net redemptions of $792 million in December and net sales of $844.5 million at this point last year. Moreover, sales were positive for the first time since last August.

Yet, long-term mutual funds had net redemptions of $194.5 million in the month. All the sales were in money market funds, led by over $1 billion in Canadian money market funds. Long-term fund redemptions were down from $2.58 billion in December and $3.78 billion at this time last year.

Additionally, RBC accounted for $1.25 billion in overall net sales on its own, led by almost $1.4 billion in money market sales. MD Management and IGM Financial were the only other firms with as much as $100 million in monthly net sales.

Most other firms either had modest net sales of were in net redemptions. IGM led the way in long-term net sales, with $164.8 million of sales coming in the long-term funds of its Counsel subsidiary.

Fund-of-fund sales were back in positive territory in January at $144.6 million, IFIC also reported. Funds-of-funds had net redemptions of $55.6 million in December and $320.8 million at this point last year. While sales were in positive territory in January, total mutual fund assets slipped another 3% in the month to $491.1 billion at the end of January. Total AUM is also down 20% from a year ago, and long- term fund assets fell by 24.6% over the past 12 months to end January at $418.8 billion. Major declines in most equity markets over the last 12 months were the largest contributor to drop in industry assets, IFIC said.

“January fund sales strengthened from December and outpaced what we saw last year at this time due to both increased investor interest in bond funds and a substantial drop in net redemptions in other fund categories such as Global Equity,” said Pat Dunwoody, IFIC’s vice president, member services and communications. “Overall, it was a respectable start to the RRSP season.”