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BlackRock is unparalleled. The US asset management company is the largest in the world, thanks to a controlled mass of over 12,000 billion euros, approximately five times the Italian GDP. The fund invests heavily in Europe and the largest properties are in Italy. On the Milan Stock Exchange there is no one like them in terms of the value of the shares owned.
What the richest investment fund in the world does
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Take a bank, a state-owned company, a company in the arms or telecommunications sector: BlackRock is always there and is among the most important shareholders. The Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, had also received the CEO, Larry Fink, at Palazzo Chigi. And for a fund that manages savings, what’s better than a country of savers? In reality, there may be even more at stake than this.
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How much is 12.53 trillion dollars? Over 10,000 billion euros, approximately five times the Italian GDP. This illogical number represents the mass of properties managed by BlackRock and makes it the largest investment fund in the world. Business continues to go well: the figure is growing compared to the 10.5 trillion recorded at the beginning of 2024.
“We entered 2025 at our strongest inflection point, and I see future opportunities for BlackRock, our clients and our shareholders like never before.”
Larry Fink, Ceo di BlackRock
It has been present in Europe since 2000, when the first office was opened in Milan. Italy is still the center of the US giant: since 2023, the management has merged Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece and Israel into a single cluster called Southern Europe. The guide is entrusted to an Italian, Giovanni Sandri. According to sources Reutersthis perimeter was worth around 200 billion dollars already in 2023, around half of which attributable to Italy. BlackRock does not publish the details of revenues for each individual country: the business model is based on management fees (mainly basic) proportional to the assets and the type of products.
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To the question “What does BlackRock do?”, the company responds like this on its website: “We help our clients – and the people who rely on them – save for retirement, finance their children’s education, buy a home or start a business. As an asset manager, BlackRock manages investments on behalf of its clients, helping millions of people around the world achieve their financial goals” explains the company.
And what could be better for an asset management company than investing in the country where family assets exceed 11,000 billion euros?
Italy and BlackRock: 5 is the magic number
BlackRock has been in Italy for 25 years and in 2023 it already managed a portfolio of around 100 billion euros. But the number needs to be updated and the figure that best represents the US fund in the Italian context is 5. The figure occurs in dozens of companies in which the US giant participates with this percentage of shares, which often makes it the first or second investor. The sectors are the strategic ones of our economy and are worth just under 14 billion euros. The portfolio is diversified: state subsidiaries, banks, defence, energy, telecommunications.
According to the latest Consob communications, the stake in Monte dei Paschi di Siena has reached 5 percent, which makes BlackRock one of the participants in the banking risk underway in Italy. In the sector, the stake in Mediobanca (recently passed to Monte dei Paschi), in Bper, FinecoBank, Intesa SanPaolo, Unicredit and Banco Bpm still amounts to 5 percent. But it didn’t end here.
BlackRock continues to grow and expand in Italy, the trend of the last two years is clear. It holds 5 percent of state-owned companies such as Terna, Saipem, Tim, Enel and Snam, as well as Italgas, Moncler and Prysmian. The fund is also active in the defense sector and has exceeded 3 percent in Leonardo, the most important Italian company in the arms sector and among the most important in the world. The Meloni government played a role in all of this.
What Meloni wants to do with BlackRock
Larry Fink entered Italy without hiding, through the front door. It is September 30, 2024 and the CEO of BlackRock is welcomed to Palazzo Chigi by Giorgia Meloni. The two had seen each other on another official occasion a few months earlier: in June, at the G7 organized by Meloni in Borgo Egnazia, Puglia. The Prime Minister chaired the meeting on the “Partnership for global infrastructure and investment”, together with former US president Joe Biden. Among the guests there was also Fink, CEO of the largest investment fund in the world.
At the following meeting in September at Palazzo Chigi, there was talk of “possible investments […] in Italy in the context of the development of data centers and related energy support infrastructures”, we read in the note at the time. “The Prime Minister also shared with Fink the investment opportunities in the field of national transport infrastructures and in other sectors of a strategic nature. The establishment of a small working group, coordinated by Palazzo Chigi, dedicated to the implementation of the projects to be developed in collaboration was agreed upon as an immediate operational follow-up” we read.
A week earlier, the government had authorized BlackRock to hold more than 3 percent of Leonardo, renouncing the Golden power, a regulatory tool used to protect Italian companies from acquisition, even partial, by foreign entities.
The bankers who want the savings of Italians: this is how 740 billion euros “dance”.
Beyond the stock market there are also Italians’ savings and government bonds. BlackRock is in fact quite active with its financial instruments in the ETF sector with the IShares product range, as well as 1.22 billion for government bonds issued by the Ministry of Economy.
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But the stars and stripes domino of the US fund in the Italian economy may not be over yet: the Meloni government’s announced need to raise cash through the sale of pieces of state companies could further push BlackRock’s presence in our economy. With what limits, it is not known.
The Dossiers chosen by you readers are free for today: we are republishing this report by Cesare Treccarichi, one of the most read in 2025. Dossier is the exclusive subscription investigation section of Today.it. If you want to support our journalistic work or give a subscription as a gift Click here
Exclusive investigations every day from Italy and the world – Subscribe to Dossier Today.it
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