The giant money manager Blackrock on Wednesday turned in a strong profit in the third quarter despite the continuing uncertainty of investors.
The growth comes at a time when many investors have been continuing to shy away from taking financial risks. BlackRock benefited from the strong interest among investors in less risky bond funds and passively managed exchange traded funds. More money flowed into the company's iShares E.T.F. business than at any time since BlackRock acquired the business from Barclays in 2009.
The firm said on Wednesday morning that its profit in the quarter rose 17 percent on an adjusted basis from the same period last year, and 9 percent from the previous quarter, to $610 million. It earned $3.47 a share on a diluted basis, a record for the company, and more than the $3.32 a share that analysts surveyed by Bloomberg expected.
On a generally accepted accounting principles basis, the company earned $642 million, or $3.65 a share, u p 8 percent from $554 million, or $3.08 a share, in the quarter a year earlier.
Blackrock has grown into the world's largest money managers over the last decade thanks to its acquisition of iShares, but also as a result of growth in its traditional stock and bond mutual funds and in its more sophisticated offerings for larger, institutional investors.
In the latest quarter, the company increased the total pool of money it is managing for investors by 10 percent from a year earlier. Revenues across the company were up 4 percent from the previous quarter and also 4 percent from the same quarter a year ago, to $2.32 billion. In the last quarter, both revenues and assets under management fell at BlackRock.
The firm's chief executive, Laurence D Fink, said in a statement that BlackRock “achieved these results through robust new business generation across each of our channels with particular strength in growth areas on which we've focused, including retail and iShares.â€
