NEW YORK -- Individual investors' cash holdings in October fell to the lowest since July 2007 and Americans became more willing to invest in higher-returning assets as the economy improved, according to a new survey by the American Association of Individual Investors. The proportion of holdings in cash fell to 19% of assets last month. Investors increased both equity and fixed-income holdings, with individual stocks holdings rising about 1 percentage point to 29% of assets, and stock mutual fund holdings also up about 1 point to 28%. The organization, with about 165,000 members, surveys its members monthly. On Monday, the Standard & Poor's Index rose about 1% on better-than-expected manufacturing data, after falling 1.9% in October, the first monthly decline since February.

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