Credit concerns have once again taken center stage as the treasury community closely monitors its cash investments. These fresh concerns are relevant to U.S. cash and short-duration investors because prime money market funds are major investors in European financial debt. Approximately two-thirds of commercial paper and one half of jumbo bank deposits available to U.S. investors are obligations of non-U.S. financial institutions. We estimate that 44% of a typical U.S. prime fund is exposed to non-U.S. financial debt. For large prime funds, 69% of assets are estimated to be non-U.S financial debt, of which 55% is European, 16% eurozone, and 4.6% southern European. No direct exposure to Greece or Portugal was found but the significant dispersion of exposure among large prime funds should continue to be a reminder of the importance of credit monitoring in prime funds.

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