BlackRock suspends passive, active investment in Russian securities

BlackRock announced Thursday that it suspended the purchase of all Russian securities in its active and indexed strategies on Feb. 28 because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

BlackRock also "proactively advocated with our index providers to remove Russian securities from broad-based indices," said Richard Kushel, senior managing director and head of BlackRock's portfolio management group, and Salim Ramji, senior managing director and global head of iShares and index investments, in a joint statement.

Some of BlackRock's major index providers said they will remove Russian securities from their indexes effective next week, said Messrs. Kushel and Ramji in the statement.

Russian securities currently account for less than 0.01% of BlackRock client assets, mostly in the company's index portfolios, the two officers said.

"We will continue actively consulting with regulators, index providers and other market participants to help ensure our clients can exit their positions in Russian securities, whenever and wherever regulatory and market conditions allow," said Messrs. Kushel and Ramji.

BlackRock managed a total of $10.01 trillion as of Dec. 31.