BLK BlackRock Inc

By Allison Prang 

The world's largest asset manager, BlackRock Inc., posted a stronger profit in third quarter but reported more than $3 billion in net outflows.

The company reported $3.11 billion in net outflows for the quarter, compared with the $96.11 billion in net inflows it had for the comparable quarter a year ago. Investors as a whole took $17.26 billion out of BlackRock equity products.

Institutional investors took out $30.85 billion from non-ETF index funds, which BlackRock Chief Executive Laurence Fink attributed to "de-risking associated with ongoing divergent monetary policy and geopolitical uncertainty."

The company's iShares ETFs had $33.67 billion in net inflows for the quarter.

Earnings rose 29% from a year earlier to $1.22 billion. Per-share earnings totaled $7.54, up from $5.76.

Revenue rose 1.9% to $3.58 billion, which fell below what analysts were anticipating. Revenue from investment-advisory performance fees and distribution fees declined, but revenue from technology services -- which includes BlackRock's Aladdin risk and portfolio management tools -- climbed.

BlackRock had $6.44 trillion assets under management in the quarter that finished in September, up 2.3% from the second quarter of this year.

Shares fell 2.8% in premarket trading Tuesday. In 2018, BlackRock shares have fallen 17%.

Write to Allison Prang at allison.prang@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 16, 2018 08:13 ET (12:13 GMT)

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