Foreign investors scooped up Canadian securities for the sixth month in a row in June, driven by the largest purchase of Canadian equities since April 2004, data from Statistics Canada showed on Thursday.

Foreign investment in securities totaled a net $9.02 billion in June, while May's purchases were revised slightly lower to $13.99 billion from the initially reported $14.73 billion.

The inflow of investment was due to a $13.41 billion purchase of Canadian stocks. The bulk of this was due to the issuance of new Canadian shares to foreign portfolio investors as a result of cross-border mergers and acquisitions.

Foreign investors also purchased $2.6 billion of Canadian shares on the secondary market, despite Canada's main stock index being little changed in June.

Non-resident investors reduced their bond holdings by $3.36 billion as investors owned fewer federal government bonds, mainly due to the retirement of securities denominated in Canadian dollars.

At the same time, Canadians bought a net $4.15 billion worth of foreign securities, including a $5.69 billion purchase of equities, the largest investment in stocks so far this year.

Canadians picked up $4.0 billion of non-U.S. foreign shares and $1.7 billion in shares south of the border. Canadians reduced their holdings in foreign bonds by $1.13 billion.