By Min Zeng
The world's biggest bond fund, run by Bill Gross, took in $2.4
billion in new cash in October, boosting the inflow for this year
to $14.5 billion.
The data, released by fund tracker Morningstar Inc. on Friday,
signals that the $281 billion Pimco Total Return Fund (PTTRX)
continues to draw new investments as Mr. Gross's fund has churned
out a return that has pulled significantly ahead on the benchmark
index.
The fund has handed investors a return of 9.5% in 2012 through
Friday, beating the 4% of the Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index,
according to data from Morningstar.
Over the past 15 years, the bond fund has returned 7.3%,
compared with the 6.1% return on the benchmark.
The Total Return Fund benefited from Mr. Gross's heavy holdings
of high-quality U.S. mortgage-backed securities, which account for
about half of the fund.
Mr. Gross had bet the Federal Reserve would buy such bonds to
support the economy since earlier this year. The Fed did launch a
program to buy MBS in September.
The $14.5 billion was a strong rebound from an outflow of $3.1
billion for the first 10 months of 2011 when Mr. Gross was hit by
soured bets on a selloff in Treasury bonds.
Still, the inflow was moderate compared to $31 billion for the
first 10 months of 2010 and $41 billion between January and October
of 2009.
Mr. Gross is founder and co-chief investment officer at Pacific
Investment Management Co. Part of Allianz SE (ALV.XE, ALIZF,
AZSEY), Pimco is one of the world's biggest asset-management
companies, with more than $1.8 trillion in assets under
management.
Write to Min Zeng at min.zeng@dowjones.com