Goldstein has two framed computer disks on his office wall that show how the technology has evolved: One holds the data that BlackRock received when General Electric Co. hired it in 1994 to sort through the troubled Kidder, Peabody & Co. portfolio. The other is what clients used to install to get access to Aladdin, the comprehensive investment management system that BlackRock originally built for its own purposes and today delivers via modern hosting methods to 179 external clients, with $9 trillion under management.
BlackRock Solutions, which contributed $477 million to its parent’s $4.7 billion in 2009 revenue, also includes the advisory business that is managing the credit default swaps of AIG and other bailed-out portfolios under U.S. government contracts. Aladdin’s forte is managing complex instruments, but Goldstein, 36, is anticipating a shift toward simplicity. “Fixed income over time will become more like equities, with greater use of electronic trading, leveraging algorithms and transaction cost analytics,” he says. “We are preparing Aladdin for that world.”
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