Reuters reports that BofA's April fund manager survey found that fund managers increased their cash allocations as expectations of higher inflation, taxation changes and a "taper tantrum" leave equities vulnerable to pullbacks.

Though the majority of investors in the survey said equities were not in a bubble, BofA said positioning was peaking with a near-record 62% of investors "overweight" on stocks.

Investors' cash allocation rose to 4.1% last week versus 3.8% in February, the survey showed.

After soaring 82% from March 2020 lows and scaling $90 trillion in market capitalisation, world stocks are holding up near record highs.

Still, two-thirds of the 200 panellists with $553 billion in assets under management said U.S. equities were in a late-stage bull market. Only 7% think U.S. stocks were in a bubble.

Six out of ten investors surveyed by BofA now expect a rise short-term rates in the next 12 months, the highest since January 2019. But they expect a more than 10% pullback in stocks if U.S. 10-year Treasury yields hit above 2.1%.