BlackRock, Inc. (BLK)

The United States economy is full of innovation. It has to be. Manufacturing industries that dominated the economy decades ago - textiles, televisions, even automobiles to a large degree - have moved overseas, where labor and materials costs are lower. Yet the U.S. economy, even during the pandemic and the recent period of high inflation, has expanded to record levels. If U.S. corporations weren't innovating, creating new products (such as AI and vaccines) and services (such as Zoom calls and Netflix), as well as moving into new markets (clean energy, rare drugs), the domestic economy would not be growing, and capital would not be flooding into the country. Consider that U.S. GDP was approximately $1 trillion in 1930 but was almost $31.5 trillion at the end of 2025. That's growth of 30-times. Meanwhile, the U.S. population has grown less than 3-times during that time span, to 340 million from 120 million. The delta between GDP growth and population growth has been driven, in large part, by innovation.

BlackRock is the largest asset manager in the world, with $15.345 trillion in assets under management at the end of June 2026. Its product mix is diverse, with 58% of managed assets in equity strategies, 22% in fixed income, 9% in multi-asset classes, 7% in money market funds, and 4% in alternatives. Passive strategies account for two-thirds of long-term AUM, with the company's ETF platform maintaining a leading market share domestically and on a global basis. Product distribution is weighted more toward institutional clients, which, by our calculations, account for around 80% of AUM. BlackRock is geographically diverse, with clients in more than 100 countries and more than one-third of managed assets coming from investors domiciled outside the US and Canada.

BlackRock provides investment management, risk management, and advisory services for institutional and retail clients worldwide. Its range of products includes separate accounts, mutual funds, the iShares franchise of ETFs, and other pooled investment vehicles. Assets under management were $15.5 trillion as of September 30, 2026. iShares is a global leader in ETFs, with funds in multiple asset classes and $6.4 trillion in ETF assets under management as of September 30, 2026.

The headline logic on Wednesday was that stocks got smacked by the hotter-than-expected CPI report.' And yes, Treasury yields popped immediately after the inflation report, with the 10-year Treasury hitting 5.33% and the two-year hitting 4.95%. But yields then settled down quite a bit. The 10-year yield actually fell on the day (to 5.19%) while the two-year closed flat. The S&P 500 declined 1.1%, its first loss of more than 1%, as well as its worst day, since July 29. Once again, the real damage was in Information Technology, with the XLK dropping 3% and seeing its worst day since June 23. The Nasdaq 100 (QQQ) lost another 2% and the recent technical breakout from a bullish inverse head-and-shoulders formation has failed. The S&P 500 never officially achieved a breakout to all-time highs. While the major indices remain very close to highs, and yields have been flat of late, the market environment is very difficult.