According to Refinitiv Lipper data, investors withdrew $8.6 billion and $840 million respectively from U.S. and European equity funds but invested $470 million in Asian equity funds.

Among equity sector funds, financials, tech, and real estate funds had outflows of $751 million, $429 million, and $390 million, respectively, although consumer staples received $600 million worth of inflows.

Meanwhile, global bond funds posted outflows for a third straight week, amounting to $2.52 billion.

Global short- and mid-term bond funds saw withdrawals of $4.84 billion, the biggest weekly outflow in five weeks, but high-yield bond funds lured inflows for a second successive week, to the value of $2.35 billion.

Meanwhile, global government bond funds received inflows worth $809 million in a third straight week of net buying.

Global money market funds saw much bigger inflows, with investors bracing for the release of the Federal Reserve's meeting minutes.

The data showed investors accumulated global money market funds worth $26.4 billion, compared with an outflow of $9.4 billion in the previous week.

Energy funds remained in demand for the fifth consecutive week as they received net investment of $149 million. Investors also purchased about $18 million of precious metal funds after five weeks of net selling in a row.

According to data available for 24,768 emerging market (EM) funds, EM equity funds received $1.11 billion but EM bond funds had outflows of $201 million after $233 million worth of net purchases the previous week.

(Reporting by Gaurav Dogra and Patturaja Murugaboopathy in Bengaluru;Editing by Elaine Hardcastle)