BlackRock Inc

BlackRock is positioned for another potential earnings beat, with a positive Zacks Earnings ESP of +0.51% and a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) heading into its next quarterly report, expected on October 14, 2026. The investment firm has topped consensus estimates by an average of 9.56% over the last two quarters. In the most recent quarter, BlackRock was expected to post earnings of $12.67 per share but reported $13.91 per share, a surprise of 9.79%. The prior quarter saw a consensus estimate of $11.46 per share against actual earnings of $12.53 per share, a surprise of 9.34%. Zacks research shows that stocks combining a positive Earnings ESP with a Zacks Rank #3 or better produce a positive surprise nearly 70% of the time.

JPMorgan Chase has launched JLTXX, a tokenized US money market fund on Ethereum aimed at institutional clients, as the bank moves to build reserve infrastructure for future US stablecoin issuers. The bank is working alongside BlackRock to provide tokenized money market products that could support stablecoin reserves, with both groups building fund infrastructure aligned with new GENIUS Act rules that require regulated backing for US stablecoin issuers by 2027. JPMorgan, a US bank and financial holding company with a reported market value of about $876.1b, already runs a global payments, markets, and custody network that gives it a ready-made base to plug tokenized money market funds into real world transaction flows. The push adds to an already heavy technology and AI expense line, while players like Citigroup and Bank of America are also pursuing digital asset infrastructure.

SCB CIO, together with BlackRock, has raised its investment weighting in emerging market or EM equities to Overweight, taking the view that several markets stand to benefit from investment in AI and advanced technology, particularly South Korea and Taiwan, which play a key role in the global technology supply chain and serve as manufacturing bases for chips and electronic components supporting the expansion of AI. Meanwhile, the earnings outlook for companies in these markets remains strong, and valuation levels are not yet stretched relative to developed markets. Investment in EM will focus selectively on companies that benefit from the AI megatrend, the transition to a digital economy, and investment in new-era infrastructure. On the US equity market, SCB CIO maintains a positive view and assigns it a greater weighting than other major markets, supported by AI investment, which is driving a structural transformation of the global economy. For fixed income, yields at elevated levels make income-generating opportunities attractive again, with more than 84% of global bonds offering yields above 4%. The focus is on the middle segment of the yield curve, namely 3-7 year US Treasuries and US government mortgage-backed securities, while remaining Underweight long-dated US Treasuries and Japanese government bonds. It also maintains a Neutral weighting in short-duration high-quality corporate bonds but is Underweight long-duration high-quality corporate bonds.

BlackRock's US head of equity ETFs, Jay Jacobs, said the recent reduction of in-kind transfer minimums to about $2 million has opened the floodgates for investors moving spot Bitcoin exposure into the iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF, ticker IBIT. Speaking on Bloomberg Crypto, Jacobs said the lower minimums have driven a wave of wealth-management clients to reach out about shifting money into IBIT. He said investors are drawn not only by outsourcing custody so they no longer hold Bitcoin directly, but also by the ability to financialize the asset through custom options strategies, hedging, and borrowing against positions. Jacobs said BlackRock has had many conversations about the move from Bitcoin into IBIT and the use of its SpiderRock SMA capabilities for custom options overlays. He described the shift as a major trend in the wealth segment, where clients are increasingly asking not whether to hold more or less Bitcoin but what is the best way to own it in a portfolio.

OpenAI is in talks with multiple investment funds from the United Arab Emirates, including Abu Dhabi-based MGX, to help anchor a $30B round of financing, according to a media report on Monday. The UAE funds would form a syndicate to invest in the round and have discussed putting in as much as $10B altogether, Bloomberg News reported. BlackRock Inc. is also in discussions to participate in the round alongside that syndicate, and the fundraising is ongoing with details subject to change. OpenAI is reportedly looking to raise at least $30B in capital at a valuation of about $1.4T, as the firm pushes back plans for an initial public offering until at least next year, citing its focus on AI safety efforts. The company raised a $122B round in March at an $852B valuation, including the money. MGX has invested in prior OpenAI and Anthropic rounds, and OpenAI has held talks with the University of California's endowment fund, an existing investor, about participating, while existing backers Thrive Capital and Andreessen Horowitz have also discussed putting in money.

OpenAI is raising at least $30 billion, aiming for a company valuation of about $1.4 trillion, and has pushed back its plans for an initial public offering by at least a year, Bloomberg News reported on Monday, October 5, citing sources as saying that OpenAI is in talks with investment funds from the United Arab Emirates, including Abu Dhabi-based MGX, to become lead investors in the funding round. The UAE funds have discussed investing as much as $10 billion combined under a group of co-investors, while BlackRock is also in talks to join. The fundraising is still underway and details may change. OpenAI previously raised $122 billion in March at a company valuation of $852 billion. MGX has previously invested in funding rounds for OpenAI and Anthropic, and MGX also raised nearly $50 billion earlier this year to accelerate investment in artificial intelligence infrastructure and technology.

SCB WEALTH, together with SCBAM and BlackRock, has launched the SCB Global Multi-Asset Core Portfolio Heavy open-ended fund, or SCBGMHEAVY, a risk level 6 or high-risk fund. The initial public offering will run from October 6 to October 12, 2026, with a minimum investment of 1,000 baht. The fund runs an aggressive multi-asset portfolio with allocations adjustable from 0 to 100% and uses BlackRock's volatility control strategy to help manage risk in rapidly changing markets. Sorachai Sunetta, Deputy Head of High Net Worth and Affluent Banking at Siam Commercial Bank, said the fund is designed to give investors access to a wide range of asset classes across all regions worldwide and helps complete the Investment Shelf under the partnership between SCB WEALTH, SCBAM and BlackRock, covering every risk level, from the quality fixed-income fund SCBGOFIX at risk level 4, the mixed funds SCBGMLITE and SCBGMCORE at risk level 5, through to SCBGMHEAVY at risk level 6. Narongsak Plodmechai, Chief Executive Officer of SCBAM, said the fund uses an Aggressive Allocation strategy, focusing on aggressive investment in global equities through leading ETFs and individual stocks, while supplementing the portfolio with Liquid Alternatives. The investment strategy is divided into three parts: aggressive multi-dimensional portfolio management at approximately 85%, investment through alternative liquid assets at approximately 15%, and the volatility control strategy that is exclusive to BlackRock. The fund is managed by BlackRock Multi-Asset Strategies and Solutions, or MASS, which has more than 20 years of experience and over 2.5 trillion US dollars in assets under management.

The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation announced the DTCC tokenization service on May 4, 2026, a platform designed to bring Russell 1000 components, ETFs, and US Treasuries onto distributed ledgers. With over 50 firms including BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Circle, Ondo, and Nasdaq participating, the service moved into limited production in July 2026 following a December 2025 SEC No-Action Letter. DTCC CEO Frank La Salla said tokenization will significantly change how markets operate by bringing new levels of liquidity, transparency, and efficiency to investors, while Brian Steele of the DTCC added that the service is designed to provide systemic scale where deep liquidity already lives. The infrastructure shift extends beyond the DTCC: Nasdaq secured SEC approval on March 18, 2026, under Release 34-105047, to facilitate tokenized settlement on the same order book, ticker, and CUSIP as traditional assets, NYSE Arca followed with rule change SR-NYSEARCA-2026-45 effective April 29, 2026, and the broader NYSE received approval for its own related filings on April 17, 2026. The SEC issued a five-year conditional innovation exemption on September 17, 2026, specifically for tokenized NMS stocks, while the CFTC clarified through Staff Letter 25-39 and an updated FAQ on September 24, 2026, that tokenized collateral may be used for derivatives margin. The tokenized asset market tracked by rwa.xyz stood at approximately $38.6 billion as of late September 2026, up from $2 billion in 2022, with tokenized Treasuries accounting for $14.7 billion to $15.65 billion of that total, led by BlackRock's BUIDL at $2.70 billion, Circle's USYC at $2.60 billion, and Ondo's USDY at $2.23 billion. A June 1, 2026, Citi report estimates a base case of $5.5 trillion in tokenized assets and $1.9 trillion in stablecoins by 2030, though it warns of a messy period in which tokenized and legacy systems operate side by side.

BlackRock has significantly expanded its Bitcoin holdings after a month of consistent inflows through its Bitcoin funds, with more than $1.5 billion in Bitcoin now topping the asset manager's holdings. The leading asset management firm built the position over that one-month stretch of steady inflows into its Bitcoin funds. The figure marks the scale of BlackRock's Bitcoin exposure following the sustained buying.

The OUSD stablecoin has officially gone live with Visa, Mastercard and Stripe behind it, according to Scott Melker on "The Daily Wolf with Scott Melker." OUSD, or Open USD, is a consortium of fintechs and payment companies launching their own stablecoin to compete in a massive market where high interest rates generate essentially free money, and it is being run by Stripe, which acquired Bridge in a unicorn deal and whose Bridge CEO is also running the blockchain. The stablecoin is launching on multiple blockchains, including Ethereum, Solana, Base and Tempo, with the bulk of liquidity expected on Stripe's own Tempo blockchain, while reserves will be held at BlackRock, BNY and Lead Bank. Five founding members — Coinbase, Mastercard, Shopify, Stripe and Visa — will split the equity and have invested a billion dollars for initial liquidity, and depending on usage they will accrue more or less equity or earnings from the stablecoin, meaning earnings accrue to the companies promoting and using it rather than to a private company behind it. The launch follows a huge debate when it was announced, as 140 logos appeared including BlackRock and others, and some companies said they had never heard of it and had not gotten the memo.

U.S. spot Ethereum ETFs recorded $17.1 million in net inflows on September 28, extending their consecutive inflow streak to seven trading sessions, with cumulative net inflows reaching about $835 million and the $850 million mark now in sight. The seven-session streak includes a $143.7 million inflow on September 18, followed by inflows of $270 million, $162.2 million, $104.5 million, $66.1 million, $87 million and $1.7 million in subsequent sessions, with BlackRock's ETHA accounting for $15.4 million and 21Shares' TETH for $1.7 million most recently. On September 29, Ethereum rose about 1% to $2,745 as traders increased exposure across perpetual futures markets, with open interest up roughly $700 million and total liquidations reaching $83.17 million, of which longs accounted for $38.16 million and shorts $45.01 million. Ethereum's next major upgrade, Glamsterdam, is scheduled to go live on the Sepolia testnet on October 6, with mainnet launch targeted for the fourth quarter of 2026 though no firm date has been set, and it includes enshrined proposer-builder separation, block-level access lists and a revamp of gas fee pricing. The on-chain economy is also expanding: Ethereum DeFi total value locked rose from about $42 billion on August 19 to $53.65 billion on September 28, an increase of roughly $11.5 billion, or 27.4%, in about six weeks; the circulating value of tokenized equities reached about $3.14 billion, up about 947% from roughly $300 million in September 2025; and the circulating value of tokenized U.S. Treasuries reached $14.72 billion, doubling over the past year.

A consortium backed by BlackRock and IFM Investors has entered exclusive talks to acquire Stack Infrastructure's Asia-Pacific data centres from Blue Owl Capital in a potential US$20.00–US$25.00 billion deal, with due diligence under way and no agreement yet finalized. The move sits alongside BlackRock's expanded AI Infrastructure Partnership and its major Aligned Data Centres acquisition, underlining how aggressively the firm is building an AI-focused data centre footprint across regions. BlackRock's narrative projects $36.2 billion in revenue and $10.8 billion in earnings by 2029, requiring 9.9% yearly revenue growth and roughly a $4.2 billion earnings increase from $6.6 billion today. Five members of the Simply Wall St Community currently place BlackRock's fair value between US$1,140.65 and US$1,323.31, against a $1323 fair value estimate implying 24% upside to its current price. Investors are also weighing the risk that expanding private markets and AI infrastructure exposure raises integration and cost pressures that could affect BlackRock's ability to sustain its current earnings profile.

Traders are piling into options tied to fixed-income ETFs at a record pace as yields on 10-year and 30-year Treasuries sit at the highest in two decades. Options trading volume on BlackRock Inc.'s iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF, ticker TLT, is soaring, with the 20-day average hitting the highest level ever for the exchange-traded fund, while open interest has more than doubled over the past year and is closing in on the record of 13.55 million contracts reached prior to monthly expiration last week. Implied volatility and the premium for bearish puts on TLT have jumped to the highest since late March as investors pay up for protection against, or for wagers on, higher yields. The spike in options volumes over the last week has extended to BlackRock's iShares iBoxx $ Investment Grade Corporate Bond ETF, LQD, and the firm's iShares iBoxx $ High Yield Corporate Bond ETF, HYG. Steve Laipply, global co-head of BlackRock's iShares Fixed Income ETFs, said options on those exposures are becoming increasingly popular because they provide access to exposures that would be difficult to replicate efficiently in the underlying bond market, and Alex Kosoglyadov, head of flow equity derivative sales at Nomura Holdings, said traditional equity investors are starting to look more and more at these rate products.

OTCX Trading Limited has gone live with its integration into BlackRock's Aladdin platform, giving mutual clients direct access to OTCX's electronic execution capabilities for interest rate swaps as part of the first phase of the multi-year technology partnership announced in October 2025. The launch means institutional investors can now use OTCX for price discovery, request-for-market workflows, trade execution and post-trade processing through seamless FIX integration, all from within Aladdin. OTCX said the integration streamlines OTC derivatives trading workflows from price discovery through to execution and post-trade processing, as demand for electronic trading grows across OTC markets and firms seek operational efficiency while preserving access to dealer liquidity. OTCX operates regulated execution venues connecting buy-side and sell-side participants in cleared and uncleared derivatives.

Private credit funds showed signs of stabilizing in September as redemption requests from individual investors eased and investment performance improved after a difficult start to the year, the Financial Times reported Sunday. Flagship funds managed by Apollo Global, Ares and BlackRock reported lower withdrawal requests in the third quarter, while redemptions at Blackstone's large private credit fund held roughly steady. Ares Strategic Income Fund said investors requested withdrawals equal to 13.1% of shares during the third quarter, down from 14.4% in the prior period, while at Apollo's roughly $15 billion flagship debt fund redemption requests fell to 14.7% from 16.8%. Requests at BlackRock's HPS corporate lending fund declined to 11.5% from 13.3%, while Blackstone's $43 billion flagship private credit vehicle held steady at about 10%. Across 13 non-traded business development companies that have reported third-quarter results, investors requested $9.6 billion in withdrawals, or 10.1% of fund value, down from 11.2% in the second quarter, according to RA Stanger. Despite the improvement, the four vehicles fulfilled less than half of requested withdrawals on average as redemption limits remained in place, and limited inflows and constrained asset growth could keep management-fee expansion weak while softer performance is expected to reduce incentive fees.

Bitcoin exchange-traded funds extended their inflow streak, adding $347 million even as Bitcoin dropped below the $84,000 level. BlackRock led the fresh wave of inflows into the funds. The inflows mark a continued run of positive flows for cryptocurrency-linked exchange-traded products despite the price decline in the underlying asset.

BlackRock predicts agentic AI could become an underappreciated source of demand for digital assets, arguing in a September report titled The Machine-Native Economy that AI agents transacting independently will need machine-native payment rails built on stablecoins, native cryptocurrencies and other onchain assets. The asset manager said existing systems such as card networks and ACH can be less suited to always-on, low-value and programmable transactions, and cited Bitcoin Policy Institute simulations in which AI models generally favored stablecoins for everyday payments and Bitcoin for long-term value preservation, while cautioning the findings reflect simulated rather than actual agent behavior. The thesis is meeting real-world experimentation: Meta and PayPal announced on Sept. 22 that users will be able to shop and check out with Meta's Muse AI agent across PayPal's merchant network worldwide. Muse, launched Sept. 8, can book travel, fill out forms and make purchases after user approval, and quickly rose to the top of Apple's App Store rankings among free apps. PayPal also operates PayPal USD, its dollar-backed stablecoin, which became available across 70 markets in March, though neither company has said PYUSD will be used for Muse purchases. The news comes as Bitcoin climbed above $86,000 this week, its highest level in eight months, up about 8.8% in September after gaining roughly 25% in August, with Ether, XRP and other major altcoins also strengthening.

Bitcoin climbed to $87,395 during September 21-22, its highest level since January 2026, buoyed by institutional buying, short squeezes, and macroeconomic factors favorable to risk assets. Institutional demand was evident in U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs, which saw net inflows of $998.95 million on September 21 alone, the largest single-day inflow of the year, with BlackRock and Fidelity among the asset managers bringing money into the market. Meanwhile, short liquidations totaled roughly $648 million over the 24 hours in which prices rose. Bitcoin had earlier fallen from a peak above $126,000 in October 2025 and traded between the mid-$70,000s and the low $80,000s in September 2026, leaving the $100,000 target looking distant. Jeff Kendrick, an analyst at Standard Chartered, is keeping his bitcoin price target at $100,000 by year-end and sees that target as potentially too conservative, while prediction market Kalshi reflects a significantly higher probability that bitcoin will break $100,000 before January 1, 2027. However, macroeconomic conditions remain fluid, and the U.S. Treasury bond market and oil price factors that supported bitcoin this week could reverse.

BlackRock-backed Vanguard Renewables is acquiring Generate Upcycle's North American organics recycling operations, expanding Vanguard Renewables' network of organics recycling facilities across the US and Canada. The deal adds further exposure for BlackRock to organics recycling and renewable energy infrastructure through its interest in Vanguard Renewables. BlackRock, a US-based investment manager with a market value of about $177.1b, gains that additional exposure through its backing of Vanguard Renewables, which sits within its broader capital markets and infrastructure footprint. The move reinforces the view that BlackRock is building breadth across real assets, following private markets acquisitions such as HPS Investment Partners, GIP and ElmTree, as it competes with Brookfield and KKR in infrastructure. Analysts also flag complexity, cost and execution risk in private markets, since each additional infrastructure pocket adds capital needs, operational exposure and potential regulatory scrutiny around environmental projects.

US-listed spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded total net inflows of $998.95 million on Monday, the highest value since October 6, 2025, and the ninth-largest inflow since these funds began trading on January 11, 2024. The inflows were led by BlackRock's IBIT at $381.37 million, followed by Ark's ARKB at $289.12 million and Fidelity's FBTC at $238.84 million. The inflows marked the first three-day streak in two weeks and came just days after Bitcoin was hit by the Senate's failure to pass a cloture vote on the Clarity Act and by the Federal Reserve's interest rate hike. The inflows brought the month-to-date total to $1.31 billion, following August's $3.52 billion, while Bitcoin's price surged 44% to $85,000 this quarter, outperforming all other major assets including gold. However, spot ETFs remain down $450 million year-to-date.

BlackRock shares closed at $1,090.27, up 1.92% and outpacing the S&P 500's 1.49% gain, though the stock is down 7.5% over the past month. Ahead of its upcoming earnings report, the company is forecast to post earnings of $14.24 per share, up 23.29% from a year earlier, on revenue of $7.44 billion, a 14.26% increase. For the full year, consensus estimates project earnings of $55.96 per share and revenue of $28.82 billion, representing gains of 16.37% and 19.02% respectively. The consensus EPS estimate has risen 0.59% over the past month, and BlackRock currently carries a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold). The stock trades at a forward P/E of 19.12 versus an industry average of 11.2, and at a PEG ratio of 1.18 against the Financial - Investment Management industry's 1.07.

SCB WEALTH and SCBAM hosted the Exclusive Investment Talk: The Next Move, reading the market and pointing to investment solutions for every condition. They view AI as still driving the global economy amid volatility from the Middle East war, and recommend that investors diversify risk through two standout funds, SCBGMCORE(A) and SCBGOFIX(A). Piyapat Pattarapuwadol, Director of the Investment Strategy Department at SCB Asset Management, or SCBAM, said the International Monetary Fund estimates global economic growth this year at 3%, only slightly lower than its previous forecast, and expects growth to pick up in 2027. The global economy is still supported by investment in AI-related computing infrastructure, while risks remain from the Middle East war, which affects energy supply chains and pressures inflation, influencing the direction of US Federal Reserve monetary policy. Nawarat Jiamkitrung, Director of the Investment Product Development Department at SCBAM, said SCBAM has partnered with BlackRock to develop a solution for core portfolios through the SCBGMCORE(A) fund, which carries a risk level of 5. It is a mixed fund investing across a range of global assets, including equities, fixed income, and liquid alternative assets, dividing the portfolio into three parts: a Diversified ETF Core, Liquid Alternatives, and a Volatility Control strategy, which is a proprietary model exclusive to BlackRock. Meanwhile, investors who cannot accept high risk have the option of the SCBGOFIX(A) fund, a fixed income fund with a risk level of 4 that invests 100% in fixed income instruments, managed by BlackRock's global fixed income fund manager team, which oversees more than 1.1 trillion US dollars in assets.

TotalEnergies has agreed a $1.8 billion infrastructure partnership with Global Infrastructure Partners, a BlackRock unit, focused on African oil and gas assets. The transaction centers on midstream infrastructure and gives TotalEnergies additional access to capital tied to its African energy projects. Under the arrangement, management is effectively swapping full ownership of some African midstream assets for upfront cash and a throughput-based payment obligation over up to 15 years, bringing in US$1.8 billion without issuing equity while keeping operational control of the wider projects. Management presented the deal as a way to crystallize value in existing assets while refining how future projects are funded and managed, with the proceeds potentially directed toward LNG, power and exploration priorities. The key test for investors will be how quickly TotalEnergies discloses where the US$1.8 billion is going, including capex allocations to Angolan blocks, LNG projects or the Mistral AI program over the next 12 to 24 months.

Meta Platforms raised its full-year 2026 capital expenditure guidance to a range of $130 billion to $145 billion, including principal payments on finance leases, narrowed from a prior $125 billion to $145 billion range in its Q2 2026 report on July 29, 2026. The forward guidance nearly doubles Meta's full-year 2025 capex of $72.215 billion, and Q2 capital expenditures alone reached $31.1 billion, driven by servers, data centers, and network infrastructure. To fund the build, Meta ended Q2 with $90.3 billion in cash and marketable securities and $83.7 billion in debt, and announced a strategic venture with BlackRock to develop a one gigawatt data center in El Paso, Texas. CFO Susan Li said Meta is demand constrained today, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company is receiving quite a number of offers at a meaningful premium over what we paid for the compute, framing direct compute sales as one leg of a portfolio that also includes APIs, business agents, productivity tools, and subscriptions. The strain is visible in the quarterly numbers: Q2 free cash flow was $784 million, down 91.31% year over year, and operating margin compressed to 31% from 43%, even as Q2 revenue reached $60.801 billion, up 27.96% year over year and above the $60.286 billion consensus, with advertising revenue of $59.4 billion, up 27%.

BlackRock is increasingly positioning itself as one of the largest Ethereum holding firms as recent data shows that it is rapidly expanding its Ethereum holdings. The asset manager's Ethereum position now stands at $1.5 billion, according to the report. The move underscores BlackRock's continued buildout of digital-asset exposure beyond its spot Bitcoin products.

Krungthai Asset Management Public Company Limited, or KTAM, has announced the renaming of the KTAM US 500 Open-End Fund (KT-US500) to the KTAM S&P 500 Open-End Fund (KT-S&P500) to reflect its investment policy of tracking the S&P 500 Index. Chavinda Hanratanakool, Managing Director, said KTAM is the first asset management company in Thailand to be granted rights to use the S&P 500 trademark and index, as of 31 August 2026. The KT-S&P500 fund focuses on investing in units of the iShares Core S&P 500 ETF, managed by BlackRock Fund Advisors, averaging no less than 80% of NAV over the fiscal year, and offers both an accumulation share class (share class A) and a USD accumulation share class (share class USD) at risk level 6. KTAM views that the US stock market continues to be supported by the strength of the economy, investment in technology and digital infrastructure, and the growth of the AI industry. Analysts expect earnings of companies in the S&P 500 Index to grow 36% in 2026 and 14% in 2027, while valuation levels remain attractive, trading at a P/E of 19.1 times. Data from the master fund as of 10 August 2026 shows investment allocation across five main industry groups: technology at 38.30%, financial services at 12.01%, communication services at 9.69%, consumer discretionary at 9.53%, and healthcare at 9.11%.