Investors Lost Confidence in April, Indexes Show

“The Asian ICI is now at an all-time low, and reflects particularly concerted selling of equities by Asian domiciled institutions. It would appear that concerns about the impact of slower growth both within and outside Asia are taking their toll and causing investors in that region to increase cash and fixed income holdings,” Froot said.

In other regions, sentiment was relatively static, with the North American ICI registering a decline of 0.7 points to settle at 88.8, and the European ICI ticking down by 0.1 point to reach 100.5.

“Among North American and European investors, we observed a somewhat selective approach to equity allocations this month,” said Paul O’Connell of State Street Associates, in a statement. “Investors cut back on their positions in Latin America, and instead allocated towards Europe and the U.K., though even these flows came to a halt in the last week of the data sample, as renewed concern around Spain’s ability to meet its debt burden surfaced.”

State Street’s global index represents activity from institutional investors in more than 45 countries who engage in more than 22 million transactions annually. The Spectrem Affluent Investor Confidence Index is based on 250 monthly online interviews with the financial decision-makers in households with $500,000 or more in investable assets, and he Spectrem Millionaire Investor Confidence Index is based on a subset of the overall survey group.

In terms of consumers nationwide, the recent dip in the Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index “was prompted by a moderation in consumers’ short-term outlook, while their assessment of current conditions continued to improve,” Lynn Franco, director of the Conference Board Consumer Research Center, said in a statement. “Overall, consumers are more upbeat about the state of the economy, but they remain cautiously optimistic.”