April 24 (Reuters) - U.S. equity funds attracted the

largest weekly net investment in four weeks through April 22,

driven by upbeat corporate earnings results and optimism over

AI-linked business deals.

Investors bought a net $27.98 billion of U.S. equity funds

in their largest weekly purchase since roughly $36.94 billion

net acquisitions in the week through March 25.

Upbeat earnings from major banks and food and beverage company

PepsiCo ( PEP ) boosted risk appetite. LSEG data for 134 S&P 500

companies showed that first-quarter results for 82% of companies

topped their mean analyst estimates.

Amazon ( AMZN ) on Monday said that it will invest up to $25

billion in Anthropic, bolstering demand for the technology

sector funds.

Sectoral funds drew $7.1 billion, a third successive weekly

inflow, with tech, industrial and financial sectors gaining

$5.03 billion, $994 million and $991 million, respectively and

leading the weekly net purchases.

Investors also pumped $1.47 billion in U.S. value funds and

$4.92 billion - the biggest amount in five weeks - in growth

funds.

Demand for bond funds revived after a $841 million of weekly

net sales as these funds attracted approximately $3.4 billion of

inflows in the week.

General domestic taxable fixed income funds,

short-to-intermediate investment-grade funds and municipal debt

funds saw net purchases of $1.91 billion, $1.28 billion and

$1.02 billion, respectively, in the week.

Investors, meanwhile, ditched money market funds of a net

$16.1 billion, after roughly $177.72 billion of net sales the

prior week.