There were 2 huge industry funds that pulled their micro/small mandates in Aug last year as well as a few other instos closing their mandates/desks as PMs left. On top of that as you said, a few fund redemptions too so in all in all a pretty rough year.
Agreed, XSO/XEC (ex-mining) sell-off is over.
Should see PE expansion across the board for growth stocks again, some really good stocks out there on relatively low PE and super tight registers which will run higher over the next earnings. Suggest anyone looking at small caps to setup portfolio for the Aug/Sep earnings period right now.
My only concern at the moment is the global macro view, will post it up when I have some time but it's not looking good. We are towards the end of a bull market and my personal opinion is that I find it hard seeing the SP500 finishing the year higher than today.
(20min delay)