
BlackRock($7T Assets) CEO Larry Fink:Climate Crisis Will Reshape Finance - nwrk
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/14/business/dealbook/larry-fink-blackrock-climate-change.html
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pnako
A cynical take:

Most of BlackRock's assets under management are invested in index ETFs. Index
ETFs are essentially undifferentiated products. The indices are defined by
other companies (S&P, MSCI, FTSE, NASDAQ, etc.) and you can get your index ETF
from other providers (State Street, Vanguard, etc.) So in practice it's a
fairly competitive market. As a result, management fees and margins are very
low.

Investor activism is a way to promote more growth into active investments that
are more profitable. If you are concerned about the climate crisis, you can
consider those investments, but keep that in mind. Maybe I'm too cynical but I
think it's really hard to be a ethical investor. You don't want corporations
that exploit minerals or workers in the third world? That cuts you from Apple,
Samsung, etc. You don't want to fund wars in the middle east? No government
bonds. And so on. In fact if you were really concerned you would probably
avoid those types of investments in the first place and focus on local
businesses, etc. (but much higher risk).

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anonu
> Most of BlackRock's assets under management are invested in index ETFs

BlackRock aum is $7tr. Their ETF business is around $1tr

> . Index ETFs are essentially undifferentiated products

There are 2300 or more ETFs in the US. There's enough variety there, with
products indexed by the big guys and also "self indexed" products that
undifferentiated is really not a suitable word here

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pnako
Yeah I was wrong about index ETFs in particular but my general point remains:
most of their AUM are in passive funds (ETF or not). According to their last
annual report, only 27% of AUM are in active funds.
[https://ir.blackrock.com/files/doc_financials/2018/ar/2018-A...](https://ir.blackrock.com/files/doc_financials/2018/ar/2018-Annual-
Report.pdf)

Regarding the small ETFs: yes that's kind of my point. Most of the volume is
still in large, broad index-based funds, and BlackRock is looking for a good
story to get people to invest more into the more 'niche' funds (which includes
all the green/no-carbon funds).

