Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone. I'm Chris Meade, the General Counsel of BlackRock. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that during the course of this call, we may make a number of forward-looking statements. We call your attention to the fact that BlackRock's actual results may of course differ from these statements. As you know, BlackRock has filed reports with the SEC, which list some of the factors that may cause the results of BlackRock to differ materially from what we say today. BlackRock assumes no duty and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements. So with that, I'll turn it over to Larry.

Thank you, Chris. I'd like to begin by addressing what occurred over the weekend. The assassination attempt on former President Trump is abhorrent. I was very relieved he wasn't seriously injured, and I'm thinking about the victims of this shooting, especially the innocent person who was killed. As I wrote to my BlackRock colleagues in the hours immediately following the horrific event Saturday evening, we must condemn political violence of any kind, period. And as Americans, we must stand united to do our part to promote civility and unity for our country and provide hope for all Americans. I'll turn it over to Martin now.

Thanks, Larry, and good morning, everyone. Before I turn it back to Larry, I'll review our financial performance and business results for the second quarter of 2024. Our earnings release discloses both GAAP and as-adjusted financial results. I'll be focusing primarily on our as-adjusted results. The first half and second quarter of 2024 saw some of BlackRock's strongest performance and highest growth rates of the post-pandemic period. We're growing faster than last year. We delivered double-digit operating income growth and expanded our margin by 160 basis points year-over-year. Clients entrusted us with over $80 billion of net new assets. It was $150 billion of flows excluding episodic client activity. We generated 3% annualized organic base fee growth, our highest second quarter in three years. We ended the second quarter with record AUM of over $10.6 trillion. Our business tends to be seasonally stronger in the back half of the year and we have line of sight into a broad global opportunity set of new asset management and technology mandates that should fuel premium organic growth. We're executing on the strongest opportunities we've ever seen in our core business and building for the future. We're moving swiftly and aggressively to position our firm to achieve or exceed our 5% organic base fee growth target over the long term. At the same time, we're putting the future building blocks of accelerated all-weather organic growth, such as private markets and technology, into place with our planned acquisitions of Global Infrastructure Partners and Preqin. We're building our mix towards higher secular growth areas like private markets, technology, whole portfolio mandates, and model portfolios powered by both ETFs and active. We believe this will deliver greater diversification and resilience in revenue and earnings through market cycles. Through strong organic growth and scaling of our private markets and technology platforms, we believe we can drive compelling earnings growth and multiple expansion for our shareholders. We continue to build with our clients and more than $10.6 trillion in assets under management, BlackRock's platform is becoming the premier long-term capital partner across public and private markets. We're connecting investors, corporates, and the public sector to the power of the capital markets. Through the iShares and indexing platforms, we've developed longstanding and highly aligned shareholder relationships with global corporates. Through our advisory and technology capabilities, we are a trusted partner to governments and the public sector. These relationships are creating a wealth of opportunities for unique transactions, especially in infrastructure and private markets, and they benefit our clients' portfolios, fueling organic growth. In the second quarter, we saw equity markets power to another record high and more clients starting to re-risk. Investors waiting in cash have missed out on significant equity market returns over the last year, and more investors are stepping back into risk assets. BlackRock is a clear winner when there are assets in motion. Periods when investors are eager to deploy capital are historically when BlackRock's platform sees its most outsized growth. Clients are coming to BlackRock as a thought leader, as a partner as they rethink their portfolios and investment technology. We continue to execute on a strong set of large opportunities that are contracted near-funding or in late-stage contracting. And over the past few months, the slate of client mandates we've been chosen for is the most broad and diversified it's been in years across active equity and fixed income, customized liquidity accounts, private markets, and multi-product Aladdin assignments. BlackRock generated total net inflows of $82 billion in the second quarter, representing 3% annualized organic asset and base fee growth. Flows were impacted by an approximately $20 billion active fixed-income redemption from a large insurance client linked to M&A activity. Excluding this single client-specific item and low-fee institutional index equity flows, we saw nearly $150 billion of total net inflows in the quarter. Second quarter revenue of $4.8 billion was 8% higher year-over-year, driven by positive organic base fee growth and the impact of market movements on average AUM over the last 12 months. Higher performance fees and technology services revenue also contributed to revenue growth. Operating income of $1.9 billion and earnings per share of $10.36 were each up 12% year-over-year. Non-operating results for the quarter included $113 million of net investment gains, driven primarily by non-cash mark-to-market gains on our unhedged seed capital investments and minority investments. Our as-adjusted tax rate for the second quarter was approximately 24%. We continue to estimate that 25% is a reasonable projected tax run rate for the remainder of 2024. The actual effective tax rate may differ because of non-recurring or discrete items or potential changes in tax legislation. Second quarter base fee and securities lending revenue of $3.9 billion was up 7% year-over-year and reflected positive organic base fee growth and the impact of market appreciation on our average AUM, partially offset by lower securities lending revenue. Sequentially, base fee and securities lending revenue was up 3%, reflecting higher average AUM and 3% annualized organic base fee growth in the current quarter. Our annualized effective fee rate was flat compared to the first quarter. Ending spot AUM was 2% higher than quarterly average AUM as the market sharply recovered after April declines. Performance fees of $164 million increased 39% from a year ago, driven by both liquid alternatives and long-only products. Quarterly technology services revenue was up 10% compared to a year ago and up 5% sequentially, reflecting successful client go-lives. Annual contract value, or ACV, increased 10% year-over-year, reflecting sustained demand for our full range of Aladdin technology offerings. 80% of new logo sales this year have come from opportunities, including multiple products. We have a strong multi-product pipeline and remain committed to low- to mid-teens ACV growth over the long term. Preqin is expected to accelerate planned technology services ACV growth within our target range. Total expense increased 5% year-over-year, primarily driven by higher incentive compensation, G&A, and sales, asset, and account expenses. Employee compensation and benefit expenses were up 4% year-over-year, reflecting higher incentive compensation as a result of higher operating income and performance fees. G&A expenses were up 7% year-over-year, primarily due to the timing of technology spend in the prior year and higher professional services expenses. Sales, asset, and account expenses increased 4% compared to a year ago, primarily driven by higher direct fund expenses. Direct fund expenses increased 4% year-over-year and 6% sequentially, primarily as a result of higher average ETF AUM. Our as-adjusted operating margin of 44.1% was up 160 basis points from a year ago, reflecting the positive impact of markets on revenue and organic growth this quarter. As markets improve, we expect execution on our financial rubric to drive profitable growth and operating leverage. In line with our guidance in January and excluding the impact of Global Infrastructure Partners, Preqin, and related transaction costs, at present, we would expect our headcount to be broadly flat in 2024, and we would also expect a low- to mid-single digit percentage increase in 2024 core G&A expenses. Our capital management strategy remains first to invest in our business to either scale strategic growth initiatives or drive operational efficiency, and then to return excess cash to shareholders through a combination of dividends and share repurchases. At times, we may make inorganic investments where we see an opportunity to accelerate growth and support our strategic initiatives. We repurchased $500 million worth of common shares in the second quarter, which exceeded our planned run rate as we saw attractive relative valuation opportunities in our stock. At present, based on our capital spending plans for the year and subject to market conditions, we still anticipate repurchasing at least $375 million of shares per quarter for the balance of the year consistent with our previous guidance in January. At present, we'd expect our planned acquisition of GIP to close in the third quarter of 2024, subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. And just a few weeks ago, we announced our planned acquisition of Preqin, marking both an extension of our private markets capabilities and a launching point into the adjacent fast-growing private markets data segment. We expect it will accelerate the growth and revenue contribution of technology services. The bigger longer-term opportunity is leveraging our engines in Aladdin and indexing with our capital markets expertise to build the machine for the indexing of private markets. With the creation of public benchmarks to drive stock markets, especially visible through iShares, we believe the combination of BlackRock and Preqin can do for private markets. The momentum we spoke to last quarter is evident in our flows with $82 billion of total net inflows in the second quarter, which include the previously mentioned large outflow from one client. Excluding that single client outflow, flows were positive across product types and active in index. BlackRock led the ETF industry in flows for the first half of 2024 and the second quarter, and our flows are more diversified by product type, channel, and region than any other issuer. Second quarter BlackRock ETF net inflows of $83 billion were led by fixed income and core equity ETFs, which saw $34 billion and $32 billion of net inflows, respectively. Precision ETFs added net inflows of $14 billion in the quarter, as clients reassessed their tactical portfolio allocations, adding exposures to growth equity. BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF continues to lead, gathering another $4 billion in the second quarter for $18 billion of net inflows in its first six months. Retail net inflows of $6 billion reflected continued strength in Aperio and broad-based net inflows into active fixed income. Aperio recently crossed the $100 billion AUM milestone, logging over 20% organic growth since we acquired the business a little over three years ago. As fee-based fiduciary wealth advisors grow across the world, managed model portfolios are the main way in which wealth managers are looking to scale their practices and better serve their clients. BlackRock has the leading models business and we grow through the distribution of our own models, as well as through the distribution of third-party models that typically include strong allocations to iShares. Our partnership with Envestnet continues to help Envestnet advisors grow and to drive assets into BlackRock products through models. In the second quarter, we saw our best net sales month on the platform in nearly three years and have generated 20% annualized organic growth in 2024. Last month, Envestnet and BlackRock announced new programs to expand personalized investment strategies on the Envestnet platform across direct indexing, models, and portfolio consulting. Also in June, we announced a partnership with GeoWealth to expand our custom models offerings, which represents the fastest-growing model segment. The custom models offered through GeoWealth's platform will provide advisors with a streamlined and scalable approach that combines public and private markets in one portfolio solution. Institutional active net outflows of $2 billion were impacted by the previously mentioned single client redemption. We saw the funding of several whole portfolio assignments and strength in private markets as clients seek out and leverage our comprehensive multi-alternatives platform. Institutional index net outflows of $35 billion were concentrated in low-fee index equities. Several large clients, mostly outside the United States, rebalanced their portfolios amid record levels for equity markets. Private markets generated net inflows of $2 billion. Continued demand for our infrastructure and private equity solutions were partially offset by successful realizations of about $4 billion, primarily from private equity strategies. Finally, cash management net inflows of $30 billion were driven by government and international prime funds. Flows benefited in part from clients reinvesting in cash strategies in early April after redeeming balances during the last week of March. Net inflows included multiple large new client mandates, as connectivity between our cash and capital markets teams allows us to deliver clients holistic advice and market insight. Our scale and active approach for clients around their liquidity management are driving sustained growth in our cash platform. BlackRock's strategy and platform evolution is rooted in our convictions about future client needs, about required investment capabilities, about technology, and about scale generation. Teams across BlackRock are connected in delivering on significant client opportunities, driving product innovation, and operating more nimbly and efficiently. Momentum continues to build across our platform. We're better positioned than ever to grow our share with clients and deliver profitable growth for our shareholders. I'll turn it over to Larry.

Thank you, Martin. BlackRock's core business growth is the strongest we've seen in nearly three years, with a significant upward shift ever since our last earnings call in April. Second quarter core net inflows were approximately $150 billion, excluding lower fee episodic M&A and institutional index activities. Our structural growth areas, like ETFs, models, Aladdin, and private markets, are powering steadily higher organic base fee growth. Organic base fee growth represented the best second quarter since 2021. 2024 has been our ETF's strongest start in a year on record with $150 billion of net inflows, and iShares' June flows were the strongest month in our history and for any other issuer. We are executing on landmark mandates across our platform and on closing our planned acquisitions of GIP and Preqin. Client and stakeholder feedback on both GIP and Preqin has been increasingly enthusiastic. We are on a differentiated path to transforming our capabilities and infrastructure and to meet the growing need for private market technology, data, and benchmarking. We believe this will deepen our relationships with our clients and deliver value to you, our shareholders. Our growth in private markets provides a whole new engine for premium diversified organic growth and less beta-sensitive revenues, both of which should drive future earnings and multiple expansion. We have strong conviction that we are on pace to reach our 5% organic base fee growth target. And the expected third quarter closing of GIP will add on to our organic base fee growth potential, doubling our private markets base fees and adding approximately $100 billion of AUM focused on infrastructure. At BlackRock, we always intensely push ourselves to anticipate where markets are going, what clients will need, and how we can deliver better outcomes in better ways to each and every client. We set the standard for buy-side risk management technology by launching Aladdin on the desktops of investors over 20 years ago. We acquired BGI and iShares to redefine whole portfolio investing by blending both active and indexing to build better outcome-oriented portfolios. iShares AUM was about $300 billion when we announced our acquisition in 2009. Today, iShares is approaching $4 trillion of client money. We recently celebrated the five-year anniversary of the eFront acquisition, where ACV has now more than doubled since becoming part of BlackRock. We have never been shy about taking big, bold, strategic moves to transform ourselves and most importantly to transform our industry. Our successful business transformations are delivering our strong performance today and opening up meaningful new growth markets for our clients and for our shareholders. We continue on our mission to transform private markets. BlackRock is unique in delivering an integrated approach to help our clients across all aspects of private market investing, enabling a seamless view into investment management, technology, and data on one single platform. With a strong common culture of serving clients with excellence, together with GIP, we will deliver for our clients a holistic global infrastructure manager across equities, debt, and solutions. We will provide the full range of infrastructure sector exposures and we will offer our unique origination across developed and emerging world markets. Our recently announced agreement to acquire Preqin is another step in transforming our private markets and technology platform. As private markets grow, data and analytics will become increasingly more important. We believe our planned acquisition of Preqin will help to complete the whole portfolio by delivering high-quality data integrated with workflows. Ultimately, this should drive increased accessibility and efficiencies in private markets. And the combination of Preqin with Aladdin and eFront presents an opportunity to find a common language for private markets, powering the next generation of whole portfolios. We envision we could bring the principles of indexing to the private markets through standardization of data, benchmarking, and better performance tools. BlackRock has developed a broad network of global corporate relationships through our many years of long-term investments in both their debt and equity. For companies where we are investors, they appreciate that we are long-term, consistent, always-there capital. We are not transactional. We invest early and we stay invested through cycles. Whether it's debt or equity, pre-IPO, or post-IPO, companies recognize the uniqueness of our global relationship, brand, and expertise across markets and industries. This makes us a valuable partner, and in turn unlocks the opportunity and performance we could provide for clients. Unique deal flow and track record of successful exits create a flywheel effect, enabling future fundraising and more scaled funds. Corporates and clients increasingly want to work with BlackRock, and we are executing on the best opportunity sets we've seen in years across iShares, private markets, whole portfolio solutions, and Aladdin. Importantly, our business has great breadth with organic growth diversified across our platform. In the first half of 2024, flows were positive in active and index and across all asset classes. Our active platform, including alternatives, contributed $11 billion. ETFs remain a secular growth driver, processing $150 billion of net inflows, and already representing more than 70% of our total flows last year. And our technology services revenue grew double digits in the first half of the year. Importantly, we have notified fundings for several scaled institutional wealth management that we expect to fund over the coming quarters. For example, in the second quarter, we were selected to manage a $10 billion US corporate plan, a multi-billion fixed-income portfolio for a large defined benefit scheme, and scientific active equity strategies for several global financial clients. These add to the global mandates which we have seen that we have been chosen over the last six months, including a large US RIA, a UK pension fund, a European captive asset management are just a few examples, as we look to onboard these mandates and more in future quarters and delivering the outcomes of our clients and their constituents and what they need. Growing business momentum across our scaled asset management and technology platform is driving strong financial results. BlackRock's operating income was up 12% year-over-year or 160 basis points of margin expansion. Earnings per share was up 12%, and we remain committed to delivering differentiated organic growth at a premium margin to our investors. We continue to generate leading organic growth and our operating margin of 44.1% is over 10 points above the traditional peer average. The 5% yields in cash have kept many investors overweight in cash and nearly $9 trillion still sits in money market funds. Those waiting in cash would have missed out on broad stock market returns of over 26% over the last year, including 17% so far in 2024. Long-term outcomes and future liability matching needs more than a 5% return. Investors will have to re-risk, which should improve flows into equities and credit markets. BlackRock is always a clear winner when assets are in motion and a meaningful outperformer in periods of investors re-risking. BlackRock operates from a position of strength. We have a clear path to our 5% organic base fee growth target, and we're transforming ourselves to build a firm that can exceed that target. Clients increasingly see the value in the BlackRock model, a single unified platform designed for clients unmatched in breadth, powered by BlackRock and totally built on trust. And it goes beyond clients simply wanting to do more with BlackRock. They are looking for a partner that innovates and helps them grow. The world's largest asset owners want deep strategic partnerships, increased customization, and innovation, approaching that might include creative co-investment opportunities and co-development of strategies. BlackRock's Decarbonization Partners, joint venture with Temasek, is one example of this type of relationship. In the second quarter, we announced that its inaugural fund had a final close above its fundraising target raising $1.4 billion. The first-time fund attracted over 30 institutional clients representing 18 countries. The diversity and depth of the investor base is a testament to our long-standing client relationships and strength of our team. Insurers represent some of our most long-standing relationships and clients, and we are leveraging our insurance expertise and diversified global platform to deliver fixed-income technology and increasingly private market solutions. BlackRock manages nearly $700 billion in long-term AUM for insurance clients. And we are the industry leader in managing core fixed income for insurance companies' general accounts. Insurance CIOs are expanding their mandate with BlackRock to include private markets and structured assets. Just a few weeks ago, we awarded our first large-scale general account allocation for a private structured credit mandate. We also had success with insurers and dedicated SMAs for infrastructure debt where we have differentiated capabilities. We have deep long-standing relationships across our insurance client channel with a dedicated insurance portfolio management team. We see significant opportunity to work more closely with our insurance clients as we leverage our GA business as a potential durable source of long-term capital for our private debt franchises. The industrial logic that informed our planned acquisition of GIP has only begun to clarify in the last six months. There is a generational demand for capital and infrastructure, including the finance data centers for AI and for energy transition. Private capital will be critical in meeting these infrastructure needs both standalone and through public-private partnerships. Clients' reception to GIP has been overwhelmingly positive with strong reverse inquiry from clients excited to partner with a newly scaled infrastructure platform. We see particularly strong demand for opportunities in the AI, data centers, and energy transition spaces. Through BlackRock's relationships with corporates and sovereigns, BlackRock is at the center of the investment opportunity being shaped by the demand for generative AI. AI cannot truly happen without investments in infrastructure. These technologies require a new generation of upgraded data centers, which will need enormous amounts of energy to power them. With the AI-fueled need to build data centers, we see great potential to monetize the 4.3 gigawatts of power production capacity of generational assets currently owned by BlackRock's infrastructure funds. When we talk to leaders in industry and governments, they express their desire to build out data centers, AI, technology, at the same time to decarbonize. Our Diversified Infrastructure fund recently invested in Mainova WebHouse, a first-of-its-kind partnership, to invest in a hyperscale data center platform in Frankfurt, run entirely on renewable energy. And our planned acquisition of GIP will add a number of global data center assets to our portfolio. We plan to be a leader in this space, leveraging our expertise to drive capital formation and unique deal flow to generate returns for our clients. For decades now, BlackRock has helped investors benefit from the growth of the capital markets, supporting their path to financial security and long-term objectives like retirement. Early in the second quarter, we successfully launched LifePath Paycheck with a subset of committed clients. We expect additional commitment plan sponsors to fund over future quarters, and we have a very strong late-stage pipeline. More than half the assets we manage are related to retirement. Our growth investments to enhance our capabilities and strategies like active target date and infrastructure underpin our commitment to improving retirement outcomes. BlackRock continues to create more access and connections between long-term investors and capital markets, both in the United States and throughout the world. Early this quarter, we announced an agreement with the Public Investment Fund, the PIF, to launch an investment management platform in Riyadh, which aims to accelerate the development of our local capital markets and enable foreign investment into the region. We expanded our Jio-BlackRock joint venture in India beyond asset management to brokerage and wealth management. And just last month, we joined a new coalition to mobilize infrastructure investments in the Indo-Pacific region alongside GIP and other global investors. In the U.S., we announced the new opportunity for BlackRock to help expand domestic capital markets by investing in the creation of the Texas Stock Exchange. The exchange aims to facilitate greater access and increase liquidity in U.S. equity capital markets for investors. Our investment builds on a history of investing in similar market structure opportunities for the benefit of BlackRock clients. ETFs will continue to grow as a technology that provides simple efficient access to capital markets, making investments easier for clients of all sizes. Our investments over time are driving accelerated momentum across our ETF platform. Second quarter ETF flows of $83 billion were positive across our core equity, strategic, and precision categories. ETF flows of $150 billion in the first half of 2024 represent the best start to the year in iShares' history and are more than double what they were in the first half of last year. BlackRock leads the ETF industry in flows. We are also facilitating market expansion. Our Bitcoin ETF reached nearly $20 billion in its first six months and is the third highest-grossing exchange-traded product in the industry this year. Three of the five top asset gathering bond ETFs are iShares, and our active ETFs are growing contributors with $12 billion of net inflows in 2024. We remain focused on innovating our product offerings, particularly with active ETFs, growing bond ETFs while extending distribution partnerships to make iShares the provider of choice across all wealth platforms. In June, we expanded access to our alpha-seeking expertise through the launch of active U.S. equities and high-yield ETFs managed by some of our leading investors. And we are partnering with several international banks and brokerage platforms to expand distribution and access to our products. Examples include our relationship with ETF savings plan providers and our recent selection as a premier partner to Envestnet. From winning our first client to serving millions of investors today, Aladdin has been the technological foundation for how we deliver our clients across our platform. Aladdin isn't just the key technology that powers BlackRock; it also powers many of our clients. We see clients increasingly using the technology investments across the fintech and data ecosystems. We're partnering with clients who are increasingly looking for comprehensive technology solutions across their entire portfolio, from risk analytics and investment management to accounting capabilities. The need for integrated investment and risk technology as well as whole portfolio views across public and private markets is driving durable ACV growth. Years ago, we anticipated that clients would benefit when alternative investments were evaluated inside a portfolio-level risk management framework. As allocation to private markets increased, we knew the ability to seamlessly manage portfolios and risk across public and private asset classes on a single platform would be critical. BlackRock invested ahead of these clients' needs, acquiring eFront in 2019 and going on to integrate it with Aladdin to deliver a whole portfolio view. And our planned acquisition of Preqin will expand our capabilities beyond private markets, investment management, and technology to data. We see a significant runway ahead as private market allocations from our clients will continue to grow alongside their need for an integrated enterprise-level investment technology, data, and analytics. Much of BlackRock's success and our momentum today has come from anticipating and making calls on what our clients will need as they pursue long-term outcomes like retirement and financial security. We constantly innovate, evolve, and transform ourselves, making sure we deliver for each and every one of our clients. We've spent decades building our global network of relationships, data, and analytics, integrating technology. These are the key differentiators to deepening our relationship with clients and accessing unique investment opportunities and partnerships. With our planned acquisition of GIP and Preqin, and core business strength, BlackRock's capabilities have never been stronger. We have the most comprehensive platform in the asset management industry, integrating across public markets, private markets, and our Aladdin technology, and we are creating a differentiating private markets approach. We're building what our clients need for success: a skilled private market platform encompassing investment workflow through eFront and data and risk analytics through Preqin. By bringing together investments, technology, and data across public and private markets, we have the opportunity to drive better portfolio outcomes for investors and open up diversified higher multiple earning streams for our shareholders, you. We look forward to delivering strong performance for our clients along with differentiated growth, which will be an opportunity for you, our shareholders. Operator, let's open it up for questions.

Thank you. Your first question comes from Alex Blostein of Goldman Sachs.

Good morning, Alex.

Hey, good morning, Larry. Hello, everybody. So, lots of optimism on the firm's trajectory for organic growth, and I heard you guys obviously echoing maybe some of the comments from last quarter around the strong pipeline and Martin's comments around premium organic growth. So, maybe help contextualize this a little bit more. What did the pipelines look like today? What kind of the timing of some of these conversions that you anticipate? What asset classes? And ultimately, what that means for the firm's organic base fee growth for the back half of '24? Thanks.

Thanks, Alex. I'll start, and I think Larry will add some color. Q2 organic base fee growth, as I mentioned, was 3%. We had that typically seasonally slow start of the year in Q1. So, 3%, it's just about at our target for where we thought we'd be in May and June. We really see excellent momentum, and I think you got that in Larry's comments. But I'd say on the measures we look at for fee growth velocity, sort of last three months, last six months, last 12 months, organic base fee growth, Alex, keeps grinding up by 1 percentage point; it's 1% to 2% and now 3%. And we really feel that markets are on this precipice of a reset. Rate cuts should normalize bond markets; they should normalize fixed-income allocations; they should fuel equities; and they should really drive flows. We've been a really meaningful outperformer in these re-risking periods. If I look at sort of previous election cycles and rate reductions, BlackRock had huge upside capture. In '17, '18, '21, we were well above our through-the-cycle targets for organic growth in those periods. And I think when we look at growth, it's going to come from these strong structural growers, and those things grow even faster in supportive markets: ETFs, models, Aladdin, our expanding private markets business. We're closing in and growing our AUM by over $100 billion in private markets with our planned GIP acquisition, and we see that as a huge growth opportunity. So, we'd expect those engines to really capture additional growth that hits our targets, and even on the most modest growth assumptions for beta end markets to really drive significant differentiated durable earnings and multiple expansion. We look at this all the time as a team. We've achieved our premium organic base fee growth target of 5% on average over the last five years, and BlackRock has a lot of positive leverage to re-risking periods in the market that gives us a great deal of conviction about the path to 5% in the back half of '24 and also our longer-term ambition to be at 5% or better as we grow private markets and technology.

Alex, I want to add some broader context. We've never had more engaging discussions globally than we do now, spanning various products. I genuinely believe our position in iShares is stronger than ever. Our ability to deliver active ETFs, innovate in crypto, and offer more specialized products during a time of global fragmentation enables us to engage more effectively with our clients. The feedback we've received over the past six months regarding our planned acquisition of GIP and our discussions with sophisticated investors around the world is unparalleled in terms of exploring partnership opportunities and further developments. In my earlier comments, I mentioned the intersection of power, AI, and data centers. I see this as one of the major growth drivers as we aim to make AI accessible to everyone, not just large organizations, but to all nations globally. This initiative will require trillions of dollars in investments. Our interactions with hyperscalers, governments, and various suppliers in infrastructure present opportunities beyond what I could have envisioned just seven months ago when we were considering the transaction. Discussions with sophisticated sovereign wealth funds and RIA channels highlight the growing demand for data and analytics in the private sector, and no other firm is positioned like we are with Aladdin, eFront, and now Preqin to support more investors. We are adopting a unique approach, a strategy we've successfully employed in the past, with bold actions. When we acquired eFront, the perceived price was high, yet we have doubled our annual contract value. Martin mentioned Aperio, where we surpassed $100 billion in assets under management. Our discussions on AI at BlackRock, particularly AI for Investments, reveal a significant opportunity in systematic equities, where we have maintained a 10-year track record of about 90% outperformance. I believe this trend will continue as more investors seek to leverage AI for investment purposes. We have one of the leading platforms utilizing AI and big data. Therefore, I am very optimistic about our high-growth potential in increasingly high-fee products, while also being eager to enhance our product offerings across the board through our ETF platform.

Your next question comes from Craig Siegenthaler with Bank of America.

Good morning, Craig.

Hey, good morning, Larry. So, our question is on the outlook for technology services revenue growth. With tech ACV growth at 10%, which is the low end of your long-term target range, we want to see if you have visibility into the future trajectory given the timing of larger contract wins within your existing pipeline, in conversations with clients. And now that you have Preqin, how will that also impact the 10% to 15% target in 2025 after the deal closes?

Thanks, Craig. I'll start, and I know Larry will add. Technology is just the main engine for investment performance, right? It's the main engine to drive operating leverage. It's what great firms are using to have great client experiences that fuel growth. And we see a very consistent growth rate in how clients are investing in more technology. I can tell you as a CFO, if I could invest in tech spend, I would. Generally in the marketplace, there's just an acceleration in tech spend across the board. But I think importantly, clients are trying to retire this kind of spaghetti patchwork of legacy systems they have. They want to leverage fewer providers. They want to do deep integrations across the fintech and data ecosystems. They want to have a whole portfolio view across public and private markets. That's always been the thesis of the Aladdin platform. It's how we use it at BlackRock and with our external clients. It was what drove the integration of eFront and Aladdin. And now with Aladdin, eFront, and Preqin, we think we have even more opportunities to benefit new clients, and the pipeline is very strong. Tech services revenue was up 10% year-over-year, 5% sequentially. As we continue to get the big assignments and new sales from the prior years going live, we expect those revenue numbers to stay strong. Our ACV target, Craig, it's over the long term. We've achieved it on average since we first started disclosing ACV in 2020. And we think we have a real opportunity to apply and drive indexing principles using Preqin, Aladdin, and eFront together across tech, data, and investments. Preqin is expected to accelerate our planned technology services ACV within our target range. It's going to increase current ACV dollars by about 15%. So, we'll continue to target low- to mid-teens growth in tech services ACV, and we'd expect bringing together Aladdin, eFront, and Preqin to be the way that we can get there over the next few years.

Craig, but our line of sight — we are in conversations right now with probably the broadest and largest potential Aladdin assignments we've ever had. So, the conversations we're having are with broader deep discussions than we've ever had, and much of it has to do — the serious big giant conversation we're having right now are based on the ability that Aladdin can provide both public and private data analytics. And two, we deliver. There are many examples where people made big, broad promises, and there were years — I want to underline years — delayed in the implementation. We have a deep history of delivering on time. That doesn't mean it doesn't take a long time to do it, but we have a huge reputation because of our expertise in delivering the technology platform on time. These are very big and complex, and we do it very well. And now with the combination of Preqin alongside eFront and Aladdin, we have probably the biggest opportunity we've had in 10 years or more to deliver an even more differentiated technology and analytical platform. By doing so, it could really then expand our entire platform in terms of benchmarking and indexing. As you know, that's been a province of other organizations. Historically, asset managers were precluded by the SEC from being in this business. This is why we were never in this business. Asset management firms can now be in it, as you know, and we create some type of customized index, but we view this as a unique opportunity now for BlackRock. With our position and role, we are going to do this with the same, I would say, industrial fortitude as we did in the early years when we were just an asset manager needing risk analytics, so we did it ourselves, and then we were so proud of what we did ourselves we offered it in the '90s to our clients. We are going to do this in the private markets. And this is going to take time, but I think we have a real ability to provide a very differentiated platform in this, and this is something of sheer excitement. And if we succeed, this will add a whole new revenue line to BlackRock's revenue side. Thanks.

Your next question comes from Michael Cyprys with Morgan Stanley.

Hey, good morning, Larry.

Hi, Mike.

Hey. Just a question on the alts business and GIP with the deal expected to close in the third quarter. Can you just talk about your expectations for flows there in the infrastructure space? What strategies are you in the market raising or could be in the market raising over the next 12 months? And maybe talk about some of the steps that you may be able to take to bring some new products to the marketplace, including extending into the private wealth channel?

Great question. Thank you. Well, obviously, we are doing whatever we legally can in terms of making sure that we are making sure that there are two operating entities until we get legal approvals and we close. But that being said, BlackRock is having incredible conversations. GIP is having incredible conversations. We have business integration meetings, which we are allowed to do. The enthusiasm between our team and their teams are way beyond our imagination. This feels so fantastic right now between our organizations and the opportunity we have. As we said, we expect this to be announced in the third quarter. Hopefully, later in the third quarter, we have other announcements of things that we could be talking about, but I'm not really permitted to talk about what are the deals, or what are the things we're doing. What I need to emphasize is our incredible enthusiasm for what we have and the opportunities we have, and I do believe we will have post-closing some amazing opportunities and therefore some amazing announcements.

Your next question comes from Bill Katz with TD Cowen.

Good morning, Bill.

Okay. Thanks very much for taking the question. Just coming back to the opportunity for Preqin, how do you sort of see the product evolution? And is there a pathway here for ETFs given the underlying illiquid nature of the investments? Thank you.

Thanks, Bill. We are very excited about the Preqin transaction as it opens up a new growth segment for our clients and expands our data services at BlackRock. We see a significant opportunity to enhance Preqin by integrating it with our Aladdin and eFront capabilities, leveraging our extensive client relationships and distribution networks. We will continue to offer Preqin Pro as a standalone service within our data products. There are three key areas we are focusing on to ensure the success of the Preqin transaction. First, we aim to increase sales by developing comprehensive fund deal-level databases and integrating data and workflow into a more unified platform for better client service. Second, we plan to innovate and launch new data products. It's impressive when you consider the public markets and the relationship that risk models, indexes, and data have established for indexing, benchmarking, and asset allocation; we see similar opportunities in the private markets by merging risk models, benchmarks, and investable indices. We believe indexing the private markets presents one of the most promising opportunities in BlackRock's history. Lastly, we have the potential to achieve significant scale. While Preqin has its data factories, which is not the main reason for the transaction, we believe we can foster profitable growth, enhance scale, and improve efficiency by creating a seamless operational organization. The feedback from general partners, limited partners, and service providers, all of whom are committed Preqin clients, has been very positive. They are eager about the chance to integrate the eFront and Preqin data sets. We see many great opportunities ahead for growth and are looking forward to finalizing the Preqin transaction by the year's end.

I would just add one more point to that. The inquiries that we've had from large vendors, exchanges, and different organizations about how we can leverage what Aladdin, Preqin, and eFront have, and how we can distribute and utilize that, are great indicators that the ecosystem recognizes the opportunity we have. It wasn't very clear that with eFront and Aladdin, we are in a unique position to integrate this. This is one of BlackRock's real strengths. Now we need to close this and execute on it. As I mentioned earlier, this could be transformational and fundamentally change the entire foundation of public and private markets. If we replicate what we achieved for public markets with Aladdin and data, and what we did for public markets with ETFs and iShares, and further transform more private products into retail products utilizing our data and analytics, we will revolutionize the capital markets. BlackRock takes pride in how we've influenced the capital markets, and this is another step in how we can contribute to the global capital markets.

Your next question comes from Dan Fannon with Jefferies.

Good morning, Dan.

Thanks. Good morning. Wanted to follow-up, you talked a lot — about a lot of momentum across the business. Fixed income has been a topic for some time, and flows have been a bit more mixed here year-to-date. I guess in the conversations you're having, do you still see that as one of the big areas of incremental growth as the interest rate environment evolves?

I believe, as I mentioned earlier, that maintaining a 5% yield is sensible unless your liabilities are long term, in which case you may actually lose money, especially with equity markets up 24% and 17% this year. That said, we're noticing that other clients are starting to take on more risk. It's important to point out that iShares fixed-income flows were essentially flat, meaning that the growth in assets under management in iShares fixed income was largely due to re-risking. This indicates a trend where we may see increased ownership in fixed income through ETFs. This is part of an ongoing evolution. We're also seeing growth in private markets and private credit. We are optimistic as more clients will likely utilize infrastructure debt. As these trends unfold, similar to equities, we are beginning to observe a shift in the bond market. Many investors are using ETFs as a fundamental part of their fixed-income portfolios. Our bond ETFs have experienced significant growth this year despite a flat market, which illustrates that more investors are seeking fixed-income exposure primarily through ETFs. If clients aim to enhance their fixed income returns, they are likely to look towards less liquid areas such as private credit, mortgage-backed securities, and infrastructure debt. Therefore, I believe we are well-prepared for a time when investors begin to move away from cash, directing their investments more towards fixed income and bond funds, as well as alternative income-generating ETFs.

Your next question comes from Ken Worthington with JPMorgan.

Good morning, Ken.

Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking the question. Cash management had a strong quarter. To what extent are you seeing or still seeing different and additional institutional clients migrating out of banks to money market funds to get higher yield? And where would you say the global markets are in terms of this transition to higher-yielding forms of cash management? And then to the last question, you called out re-risking a couple of times. Are you seeing re-risking coming out of cash, or is re-risking really a migration within other asset classes either extending duration or going out the risk curve in equities? What are you sort of seeing in terms of that re-risking?

Thanks, Ken. It's Martin. So, cash flows, $30 billion as I mentioned, largely driven by government and international prime funds. We had that dynamic at the end of March and the Good Friday dynamic where clients have come out, and then we saw a significant kind of return and an increase in balances in early April. We had multiple large new client mandates. I flagged that the cash platform today is about $780 billion. It's grown more than 50% over the last five years. And investors, they are earning a real return in cash. We expect that investors will re-risk. But I'd say a couple of dynamics we've definitely seen in the platform. Post-Silicon Valley Bank, we saw through sort of Cachematrix, we saw in our institutional business, I think clients just being more mindful, tactical, and kind of operationally flexible in how they manage cash. We think that largely for an institutional manager like BlackRock that's been a good trend of being able to put together technology and customized liquidity accounts in a way that we can grow. And then, ultimately, we have seen this business grow, but I'd also flag that bond ETFs have been a real surrogate, I think, for kind of how clients are managing cash. As Larry mentioned, over the last year we've seen $100 billion basically of organic growth in bond ETFs, which I think have been used as cash or cash proxies along the way as clients manage their liquidity dynamically across money funds, separate accounts, and traded instruments like ETFs.

Let me elaborate on the asset allocation towards increased risk-taking. It seems to be a mixed situation. As we noted earlier, many pension funds are indicating that their assets have reached their liability levels, leading them to feel they don't need to hold as much in equities. This trend may continue if equity markets keep rising. Additionally, with interest rates remaining elevated for an extended period, pension funds have a set liability rate; however, if interest rates decline, their liabilities could increase slightly. Some clients are indeed reducing their risk exposure, but it's worth noting that they're not merely shifting from equities to cash; instead, they're moving from equities to various fixed-income instruments. I anticipate more investments into infrastructure due to its lower volatility and higher potential returns. Clients globally are reassessing their risk profiles. Some clients holding excessive cash are facing costs for that, and it will be interesting to see how they adjust their risk exposure. Over the past six months, clients with significant investments in illiquid strategies like private equity, facing liquidity challenges, have opted to maintain higher cash balances. Once the private equity markets stabilize and offer more distributions, we may see some of this cash being reinvested. Overall, there's a lot of variability, but I expect a shift towards greater bond allocations as a result of the long equity rally over the past decade, along with deeper engagements in private markets, particularly in private credit and infrastructure. The utilization of ETFs as a fundamental part of investment portfolios is likely to grow more prominent. Investors will increasingly lean on core fixed-income and equity ETFs while balancing these with more diversified and potentially illiquid strategies. I believe BlackRock is exceptionally well-positioned for this evolving landscape.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the allotted time for questions. Mr. Fink, do you have any closing remarks?

I do, operator. Thank you. And thank you for all joining us this morning and for your continued interest in BlackRock. Our second quarter results are possible because of our deep partnerships with our clients around the world and our One BlackRock approach in everything we do. We are well-positioned to execute on our landmark mandates across our platform and we're closing in on our planned acquisitions of GIP and Preqin. We see unbelievable growth opportunities for our clients and our shareholders for the rest of 2024 and beyond. Everyone, please stay safe, stay cool, have a lovely summer as best you can. Enjoy our political conversations over the next few weeks. Be active, and have a great quarter.

This concludes today's teleconference. You may now disconnect.