BlackRock is the world's largest asset manager. It is run by Larry Fink, who started his career in finance in 1976. Rob Goldstein is the firm's chief operating officer. The firm opened in 1988 as part of Blackstone, a private-equity firm; the two broke up in 1994. For decades BlackRock's world was one of public markets, low fees and retail investors, while Blackstone focused on private markets. The combined market capitalisation of BlackRock, Blackstone, Apollo and KKR has increased over the past decade from $125bn to $500bn—from 10% of the value of America's banks to 21%.
BlackRock has been a vocal advocate of opening private markets to retail investors, with Fink devoting his 2025 annual letter to shareholders to the subject. The firm has jumped into private markets, spending the equivalent of a quarter of its market capitalisation on acquisitions: HPS, a private-credit lender originally carved out of JPMorgan; Preqin, a data firm; and Global Infrastructure Partners. It also bid for strategically important ports in Panama owned by CK Hutchison, a Hong Kong-based firm, in a $23bn deal alongside MSC, a Swiss-Italian shipping giant, earning praise from Donald Trump. China sought to reshape the deal by proposing that COSCO, a state-owned shipper, join the buyers.
BlackRock's tokenised money-market fund, the largest of its kind, is now worth over $2bn. Fink has said he expects tokenised funds to become "as familiar to investors as ETFs".
Together with Vanguard, BlackRock dominates the "buy and hold" world of passive investing through low-cost index funds and exchange-traded funds.
Rick Rieder, BlackRock's chief investment officer for fixed-income markets, has argued that a services-dominated economy is "incredibly consistent" and rarely enters recession except during a major shock such as a pandemic or financial crisis. Since 1990 American goods consumption has fallen on a quarter-on-quarter basis in 27 quarters, whereas spending on services has contracted in only five.
BlackRock acquired Aperio, a tax-aware separately managed account specialist, in 2021. Since then its SMA assets have risen by more than 20% year on year. Its tax-strategy line was among the firm's fastest-growing businesses by 2024.
If I had only known, I would have been a locksmith.