The survey, conducted globally from 4 February to 10 February, canvassed the opinions of 188 fund managers and found that a net 51% are now overweight technology shares, up from a net 39% in January.
A greater confidence in financials saw net underweights in banks and insurers fall to 7% each, but they turned negative on pharmaceuticals, moving from a net 12% overweight in January to net 4% underweight this month.
Increased confidence on US equities – a net 34% of respondents are now overweight, up from a net 27% in January and a net 16% in December – has been accompanied by increased expectations of a US rate rise in the next 12 months, a net 70% seeing rates rising over the next year versus a net 62% in January.
The survey’s headline reading found that a net 67% of allocators are overweight global equities, the highest reading since the survey began asking the question in April 2001.
Notably, the proportion of managers with a net overweight to global emerging markets equities fell from 43% in January to just 5% in February – the steepest such fall in the survey’s history.
