‘Clinton Factor’ Cited as Mutual Fund Sales Climb : Investing: The President-elect’s economic programs could benefit munis and the stock of growth companies.

Bill Clinton gave the nation’s $1.56-trillion mutual fund industry a boost this month as investors poured money into funds that buy municipal bonds and stocks of companies with strong earnings growth.

“It’s the Clinton factor,” said Steve Radis, a spokesman for Kemper Financial Services, a Chicago mutual fund company with $70 billion in assets. “Our municipal bond fund sales were $60 million in November, triple what they were in October,” he said.

President-elect Clinton’s economic programs are expected to boost municipal bonds because he plans to focus on improving the nation’s infrastructure--roads, bridges, communications and transportation. Much of that work will be funded with municipal bonds.

Meanwhile, growth company stocks are rising, in part, because Clinton is expected to favor investment tax credits that would help these companies.

“Clinton got elected and look what happened,” said Brian Mattes, spokesman for Valley Forge, Pa.-based Vanguard Group Inc., the nation’s second-largest mutual fund company, with $95 billion of assets.

Through Nov. 24, investors shoveled $96 million into Vanguard’s $1.7-billion U.S. Growth Portfolio, which invests in big, fast-growing companies such as Merck & Co. and RJR Nabisco Holdings Corp. In October, the fund’s sales totaled $55 million.

Sales in Vanguard’s small-company funds, which stand to gain the most from investment tax credits, surged, Mattes said. The $600-million Explorer Fund of small- and mid-size companies had sales of $25.3 million through Nov. 24, up from $1.3 million in all of October. Sales for the $235-million, Small-Cap Index Fund surged to $13.3 million this month from $2.2 million in October, he said.

Overall, November’s mutual fund sales will be about the same or slightly higher than in October, according to company officials.

October’s sales slumped to $28.0 billion from $29.4 billion in September, according to the Investment Company Institute, an industry trade group. The sales were the lowest since May and marked the third consecutive month of declining sales, said John Collins, a spokesman for the institute.

Despite the decline, 1992 mutual fund sales through October of $294.9 billion swamped 1991’s full-year results of $183.6 billion, the previous record, Collins said.

“It’s another in a succession of billion-dollar months, which has been unbroken all year long,” said Vanguard’s Mattes.

Investors bought $15.4 billion of Vanguard mutual funds through the end of October, shattering the record $14.7 billion deposited in all of 1991, he said.

The industry’s sales fell in October as assets of the nation’s junk bond funds dropped by $3.3 billion to $31.7 billion, the first decline since last December.

Investors withdrew money from junk bond funds as prices in the market for high-yield, high-risk bonds sagged 1.3%, according to Salomon Bros. Prices dropped amid record sales this year of $35 billion in new bonds.

Investors withdrew $550 million from Vanguard’s junk bond fund in October and put $170 million back into the $1.9-billion fund this month as prices recovered, Mattes said.

At Kemper, investors yanked $200 million from the company’s $1.9-billion, high-yield bond fund in October and returned $160 million this month, Radis said.

Municipal bond funds suffered $1.7 billion in withdrawals last month as President George Bush gained in the polls, the Investment Company Institute said. Most of the withdrawals came in late October as Clinton’s lead narrowed, said Mattes.

On Oct. 19, Vanguard’s municipal fund sales totaled $140 million, he said. By the end of the month, the sales dwindled to $21 million as investors moved money out of municipal bonds.

This month, investors “came racing back” and poured $312 million into the municipal funds, Mattes said.