Blackrock

Rumors swirling earlier this morning that the identity of the heretofore unknown direct bidder may be none other PIMCO competitor BlackRock. In part these rumors have been fuelled by an earlier WSJ article "BlackRock plays it safe - Treasuries" in which author Min Zeng notes that "the world's largest money-management firm by assets, has increased its holdings of Treasury securities in recent weeks in response to the unsteady outlook for growth, ongoing sovereign-debt woes and contained inflation risks." If so, it will be interesting to watch the divergence in sovereign bond holdings between PIMCO, which has made it clear it finds the best opportunities in foreign holdings, namely Brazil, Russia, and Poland, and BlackRock, which prefers to play it safe by going domestic. Yet, is BlackRock merely being handed PIMCO's sloppy seconds? Bill Gross' fund has lately been marginally "constructive" at best on US Treasuries. To be sure, a deep pocketed buyer will be needed to absorb the trillions in upcoming UST supply, and with PIMCO allegedly out of the picture, the US Treasury will gladly take anyone's money at this point.

BlackRock, Inc. (BLK) Vice Chairman Bob Doll has been putting out annual predictions for 15 years. Doll, who helps oversee about $3.2 trillion at BlackRock, the world’s biggest asset manager, just released his ten predictions for 2010 and for the next ten year. Eleven of the twelve predictions he made for 2009 were right.

Bloomberg reports that the largest publicly traded asset manager has lost its two key debt-focused executives.

Bloomberg reports that Larry Fink's BlackRock has taken over R3 Capital Management, a $1.5 billion credit hedge fund started by ex-Lehman corporate bond trading desk head Rick Rieder.

This is kinda a huge deal... Peter Fisher, managing director of BlackRock (yes, that BlackRock), states in a Bloomberg interview that Goldman's first quarter trading profit is non-recurring in nature, and believes it was mostly due to AIG unwinds... It is a little shocking that BlackRock would have anything bad to say about the phenomenal resurrection of financial companies, and puts the huge "profit" in it's true light.