Investors fly away from U.S. stock funds at a rate last seen in 2009

U.S. stock funds have seen $44 billion in outflows in the year-to-date for their worst start to a year since 2009, said Bank of America Merrill Lynch strategists in a note Thursday. Meanwhile, European equity funds have enjoyed $46.6 billion in inflows so far in 2015, as the table below shows.

These flows come as the S&P 500 SPX, +0.24% is down 0.1% for the year, as of midday Friday.