Investors shun euro zone funds in April-Lipper

* UK funds industry cashes in on euro zone malaise

* Swiss funds lead way, equity funds nosedive

By Sinead Cruise

LONDON, June 12 (Reuters) - Investors poured more than 7 billion euros ($8.76 billion) into funds domiciled outside the euro zone in April, as fears of a collapse of the currency bloc smothered demand for funds from countries on the front line of Europe's economic woes.

Estimated net sales for funds in Switzerland and the United Kingdom reached 3.53 billion euros and 2.59 billion euros respectively, helping to drive sales of non-euro zone mutual funds to their highest level since December 2010, Lipper data shows.

By contrast, French, Italian and Belgian fund providers are struggling to hold on to clients, with aggregated net outflows from long-term funds topping 6 billion euros in the same month.

Germany was the only euro zone country to feature in the top five fund markets in April. Its funds sector achieved 750 million euros of net sales, 270 million euros more than fourth-placed Denmark.

However, the appetite for UK, Swiss and Scandinavian funds belies a lack of enthusiasm for investment across Europe as a whole.

Excluding money market funds, European mutual fund managers attracted only 1.6 billion euros of net new money in April as investors withdrew 8 billion euros from equity funds.

Equity-based exchange-traded funds bled 4.5 billion euros of this total, with 4 billion euros drained from the iShares DAX alone, Lipper said.

Bond funds attracted 11.1 billion euros of inflows, with emerging market and global currency products proving most popular.

UK investors flocked to park their cash in their domestic funds industry in April, the Lipper data showed.

The UK's total net assets jumped 11.3 percent month-on-month, to 732 billion euros, while the French and Italian funds industries shrank by 9.7 percent and 3.2 percent respectively over the same period.