Everything You Need To Know about BlackRock
Given that BlackRock manages nearly $10 trillion in assets under management, on $22 billion of revenue, and is the largest shareholder for literally every global firm, there seems to be far less conversation about the firm on this site -- so much to the point that I genuinely don't know what people exactly do there on the job.
What type of job opportunities exist at BlackRock? Is most of their strategy passive/index investing or are they well-regarded for active management?
If passive, what type of job would that even entail for these thousands of workers? Are they just salespeople?
Most importantly, what is the compensation ceiling for the more competitive roles at BlackRock? What about work/life balance?
Any insight would be appreciated. I hope this thread can literally be a giant journal with everything you need to know about it from an employee's perspective.
bump
Incoming SA and will try to answer this to the best of my ability.
Tons of opportunities are available through BlackRock the question is which side you want to be on. The Aladdin program has created hundreds if not thousands of new jobs that are more technology focused bringing in software engineers, account execs, risk, managers etc.
The the more traditional end BLK has both active and passive funds that have both small and large teams. In terms of passive the EII group (ETF, Index and Investing) is probably the largest. They work on passive funds either as researchers, client relationship managers or portfolio managers. This is split across regions or types of funds depending on your location or team. On the active side this is much smaller at the moment. There are only 4 active funds out of Blackrock so those teams are more lean but specialized. Ten trillion is a lot to manage and there is a strong need for smart candidates/employees to keep the gears turning. I get what your saying about not needing that many people for passive but from what I see BlackRock is a machine that constantly needs input from people instead of machines or AI algos.
In terms of compensation I think BlackRock is pretty up there. There clearly aren't going to compete with IB but my SA salary is 6 figures plus (pro-rated). Can't speak to seniors but BLK definitely competes on the street for juniors.
What are the 4 active funds?
Yeah, OP may mean four groups/divisions. They have a hell of a lot more than four active funds.
Another incoming SA here, my salary is significant lower (I start around 75k usd) in APAC. I’m on the distribution side of alternatives and was wondering which team are you on?
Can’t really disclose as I am on a small team but interesting to see how low APAC starting salary is.
But HK tax is so much lower lmao
If you go on BLK’s website you’ll see they have way more than 4 active funds and in fact more than passive. Just take a look at their fund centre and filter to show passive vs active
OP here. Writing months later now I've been at the firm. Great place, amazing WLB and really nice people. Hope more people will consider working here even if pay may be a bit under market.
Would you mind PMing me as I am interested in finding out more about ETF and Index Investing at BlackRock (specifically in a Portfolio Manager role)?
Was a SA last summer and I'm returning FT in the fall to the New York office. There's nothing really 'passive' about managing index funds. Lots of work goes into balancing the funds, maintaining the secondary market, rebalancing after changes to the underlying indices, and choosing which indices to track in the first place. Although there isn't too much active management at BlackRock, portfolios of passive funds are built for clients that give them tilts towards certain factors (strategic beta).
People are A+ and exit opportunities seem great (based off of seeing announcements on LinkedIn), but honestly a lot stick around. Met a lot of people at the VP-Director level that started with the firm, left for banking/HF/trading, and ended up returning a few years later. Sure comp may be a little lower than IB/PE, but hours and work life balance are dramatically better in most groups. Seemed like most people were genuinely passionate about the AM space and seemed excited to work. Genuinely enjoyed my time there this past summer, learned a lot, and am excited to return.
Do you mind pming me?
So for these passive management roles, they are charging expense ratios south of 0.10% typically. What does comp look like for each level?
I can’t imagine it’s even in the same ballpark as IB/HF comp? Like purely from an economic standpoint it looks like passive would be lower than anything else in finance, assuming you’re not a salesperson slinging product, right?
When you're managing 10 trillion, 10 bips is huge (average expense ratio is higher than that too). The scale of large AM firms allows them to pay decent salaries.
I can only speak for my comp because there's a wide spread across groups. Analyst base is 90-100k, with bonus targets around 25k. Comparable benefits too. Definitely not on pace with IB/HF, but when you consider that the hours often don't exceed 50ish, it becomes a lot more attractive.
Do you have any advice for incoming SA - Equities ?
How big is BLK’s active equities business? Ex alts
300 billion
As an analyst in an investing role you can expect to make between 105-125k all in in as a first year while working 40-50 hour weeks. WLB varies by group and team. I make the lower end of the TC but also work lower end of the hours with plenty of PTO. My manager and skip level manager even encouraged me to take more PTOs sometimes. I would say definitely go there for the lifestyle but not for the compensation. If you are someone who’s into the grind and wants to maximize their paycheck then BLK might not be for you. Pay progression at associate/VP levels also severely lags behind banking.
The only thing I never understand is why AM people compare themselves to banking soo often? I honestly don't really compare my comp to ibankers, I just find it quite foolish because it's a completely different skillset and as you progress it becomes even more specialised. I'm in FI so really only compare my comp to maybe ER and PC but that's about it, it really makes no sense comparing to PE or IB and feeling like you're underpaid but many do it and it genuinely baffles me.
Probably because at some point in their lives they were in the prospect pool for banking, had banking vs. AM offers, or did a 2 year ib -> pe/hf -> bschool -> LO AM. As a fresh out of undergrad hire where 99% of the industry idolizes banking it would be imprudent not to at least have considered it
Never worked at Blackrock but worked at an asset manager at a bank before moving to a smaller traditional asset manager in the fixed income side. However I know of senior folks at BLK. The senior folks are definitely underpaid among the bellwethers (Fido, Vanguard, PIMCO on the fixed income side) and even among the tier 2 players such as T.Rowe. Again, it does vary team by team so I'm speaking in generalizations. It's a great firm to work at, WLB is generally pretty good, and the people are generally great but pay wise generally speaking, it definitely lags among other asset managers. Bankers make leagues more than equivalent roles at asset manager but again, it's a different job with a much better work life balance.
I agree with the exception of Vanguard as they’re just BLK 2.0
As an intern at Vanguard can confirm this. Basically just a matter of whether you want to live in New York or Philly more or less
This is highly inaccurate. T Rowe is not tier 2, it’s way more prestigious than the passives like Vanguard or BlackRock. And you can make more money than bankers at a more senior levels in AM, particularly at one of the partnerships
Hey meant no disrespect. I really wasn't talking about prestige. I was talking about strictly from an AUM perspective. Think T Rowe is somewhere in the $1.5T range while Fido ($4.5T) and Vanguard ($7T) are much larger. I may be off with those numbers on an exact basis but T Rowe definitely smaller. And PIMCO of course is the premier fixed income shop. And relative to pay, I would venture to say on average MDs in banking make more than your run of the mill PM but there are definitely outliers with some rockstar PMs. Also on the comp side I'm talking about primarily fixed income because that's my background so maybe someone can chime in on the equity side.
Just started there and it blows my mind how little is known about this company. I did a ton of research and the things I could come up with were boilerplate stuff with no real info. I hope in the coming weeks I can update more and more on this thread to get more info out there.
Please keep us in the know if there are any updates! Also interested in finding out more about BLK but agreed there doesn't seem to be much from research that is very granular.
Would you mind sharing an update?
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What do you want to know specifically? I work with the Alts teams regularly
I interned back in the day and worked there full time in a total of 3 different groups in Investment functions. Happy to answer a couple questions here if useful.
Hi! I have a few questions about BLK. Please let me know if you can talk
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