(Bloomberg) -- The largest exchange-traded fund tracking Brazilian equities is heading for its worst month ever as investors grow increasingly concerned about the political turmoil afflicting Latin America's biggest economy.
The $6 billion iShares MSCI Brazil ETF, or EWZ, has had about $710 million of outflows in August, the most in its history. The BlackRock Inc. fund, which started in July 2000, hasn't seen a day of inflows since June 18.
The latest wave of opinion polls in Brazil show that market-friendly presidential candidate, former Sao Paulo Governor Geraldo Alckmin trails and highlighted voter support for the Workers' Party, known as PT.
“Recent polls are clearly not boosting investor sentiment,” said Michael Reynal, a fund manager at Sophus Capital in Des Moines, Iowa, who oversees $850 million in assets. “The market is worried that the reform process could be derailed.”
In the first half of the year, EWZ had almost $630 million of net inflows. But that changed in July as investors pulled $342 million. Then the fund's price started falling, tanking by more than 12 percent since Aug. 1. On Aug. 15, investors pulled $202 million from the ETF, the largest single-day outflow in almost five years. The value of the Brazilian equities tracked by U.S.-listed fund is currently $5.9 billion, the lowest in more than a year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence.
--With assistance from Tom Lagerman.
To contact the reporters on this story: Carolina Wilson in New York City at cwilson166@bloomberg.net;Vinícius Andrade in São Paulo at vandrade3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Courtney Dentch at cdentch1@bloomberg.net, Eric J. Weiner, Dave Liedtka
©2018 Bloomberg L.P.
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