BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has said artificial intelligence has great potential to boost productivity and could eventually become a technology that can curb inflation.
At BlackRock Investors Day on Wednesday, he said productivity collapse was a key problem for the global economy and “the main reason inflation is so relentless.” Mr. Fink said AI “might be the technology that can control inflation.”
The CEO of the world’s largest asset manager said AI could deliver “very big long-term investment returns” and could change the profit margins across the sector. Fink said that with the introduction of AI, BlackRock will have “the same healthy paranoia, the same healthy enthusiasm” it brings to other businesses.
Fink and other senior executives laid out a vision for BlackRock to grow as a one-stop-shop for investors, providing clients with technology, data, analytics, funds and financial market advice.
The company aims to double its private market revenue over the next five years from $1 billion in 2022 to about $2 billion. Revenues from private markets, including infrastructure, private equity, real estate and private credit, have already more than doubled since 2018.
Fink, 70, also told investors he has no plans to retire in the near future.
“I don’t plan to leave BlackRock anytime soon, but the BlackRock board and myself have no higher priority than developing the next generation of leaders,” he said.
BlackRock’s size and influence have grown over the past decade, with investors pouring money into its index funds, exchange-traded funds and other funds. The company had $9.1 trillion of client assets under management at the end of March, with net inflows of $110 billion in the first quarter as investors poured money into its cash management and bond funds. .
