European hedge funds have slashed their exposure to US banks since the beginning of the year, while more or less maintaining existing positions in their European peers, according to a report by Reuters.

The report cites a recent client report from Goldman Sachs seen by Reuters as revealing that overall, shares in European banks are outperforming US counterparts as they did not face the deposit flight experienced in the United States following the failure of Silicon Valley Bank, Signature Bank and First Republic Bank earlier this year.

The STOXX Europe 600 Banks index is up roughly 8% this year, while the Dow Jones US Banks index is down 9%.

Goldman Sachs's data shows that the long-short ratio – an indicator of investor sentiment – was close to 100% for US banks, meaning investors are on average short one bank and long another, while the ratio for European banks was closer to 190%.