They are hoarding, imo, principally because normal macroeconomic fundamentals have been out the window ever since the Great Recession and the government/Fed went hyper aggressive at economic stimulation.
When something as powerful as the Fed - which can, in essence, 'print' a virtually infinite amount of money, any time it wants to - decides to go all in in trying to control, it throws everything out of whack. Because now the economy is almost completely up to the Fed. If the Fed wants to boost the economy (or at least, the equity markets), it just starts another QE (which, btw, is still going on to the tune of several hundred billion per year...they just don't call it QE any more as they do not use 'new' money to buy the bonds - they use the money from maturing short term bonds they bought to buy more bonds).
This is why everyone on Wall Street holds their breathe whenever the Fed meets or says anything as a group.
And since the Fed has given NO clear direction about the economy, few know what they will do next. For years the Fed said 6-6.5% U-3 was one of the targets. Well that has come and gone and now they do not even talk about the U-3 any more (probably because they are realizing what a relative joke it is as an accurate measurement of employment).
Before the Fed started butting in so strongly, corporations used their own people to decide which way the economy was going and thus decide when to spend and when to 'hoard'. Well, now it's up to the Fed and all the corporate CEO's can do is wait for the Fed to decide to finally say the economy is strong enough to raise rates or that the economy is in trouble and needs more help.
One thing is certain, if the economy was growing healthily, the Fed would have long removed their ZIRP (zero interest rate policy). Obviously, it is not, so they have not. And as long as that is the case, many corporations would be foolish to risk spending their reserves on expansion.
If any of you think the epicenter of the U.S. economy is Wall Street right now? Guess again. It is the Fed building in Washington. They are - for all intents and purposes - running the show.
And remember, the Fed is the same organization that in 2007 (as the minutes from those meetings show), had virtually no clue how bad the housing crash was...even though it had already begun and should have been obvious to them.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/abc16b8a-6193-11e2-9545-00144feab49a.html#axzz3V36Ljctp