February net sales came in at the high end of expectations, allowing the fund industry to squeak by with positive results for the RRSP season.

February net sales, excluding re-invested distributions of $229 million, totalled $485 million according to the Investment Funds Institute of Canada. This allowed the industry to posted tiny positive net sales for RRSP season of $16.6 million.

Long-term funds managed net sales of $ 518.1 million over the first two months of the year, but redemptions from the money market funds helped wipe out much of those gains.

“Long-term funds posted net sales of $633 million for the month of February, the highest amount for long-term funds in almost nine months,” said Tom Hockin, IFIC’s president and CEO.

In February, bond and income funds led the way with net sales reaching $477.4 million. Dividend and income funds contributed $265.1 million in net sales, while $134 million went into balanced during the month. Investors clearly continued their cautious asset allocation decisions in the face of market uncertainty.

The weakness came in the foreign and domestic equity funds, however, recording $257.4 million and $119.7 million in monthly net redemptions respectively. These categories also produced negative net sales for the RRSP season.

Foreign equity funds managed almost $500 million in monthly net redemptions, and the Canadian equity funds saw $389 million in net redemptions.

On an asset basis, several of the banks were among the few firms to come out of the month flat or up, as industry assets slipped 1.7% in the month to $375.2 billion, down from $381.6 billion in January. Assets are down 13.1% from last February’s figure of $431.7 billion. The drop in assets is mainly due to the decline in market valuations.

Among those who managed flat or positive asset performances, the biggest firms include TD, BMO and PH&N. Smaller players such as Guardian and Manulife saw asset gains, too.

Franklin Templeton, Fidelity, AGF, AIM Trimark, AIC and Mackenzie saw their assets fall more than the industry average.

IFIC also reported the total number of unitholder accounts at 52.3 million, a 0.7% decrease over one year ago.