Business models of asset management companies and their repercussions: centralization of ownership and concentration of institutional control over the organizational structure of the international capitalist economy
Name: DANIEL FERREIRA DA SILVA
Publication date: 23/02/2026
Examining board:
Name |
Role |
|---|---|
| CAMILA VENEO CAMPOS FONSECA | Examinador Externo |
| MAURICIO DE SOUZA SABADINI | Presidente |
| RODRIGO STRAESSLI PINTO FRANKLIN | Examinador Interno |
Summary: Asset managers have acquired structural power over the overall organization of the global capitalist economy. In particular, three major asset managers with predominantly passive strategies — namely BlackRock, Inc., Vanguard Group, and State Street Investment Management — are frequently cited in the scientific literature as investment institutions with a broad capacity to influence contemporary corporate governance patterns and the international capitalist economy. This stems from the fact that they have accumulated an extraordinary volume of financial securities in their fund portfolios. This dissertation aims to investigate the process of capital centralization promoted by conventional asset managers and its repercussions on the structure of ownership and institutional control over capital at the international level in contemporary times. To achieve this goal, the business models of asset managers were initially characterized. This study sought to assimilate the characteristics that distinguish conventional asset managers, emphasizing managers of index mutual funds and passively managed Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), which are identified as microstructural drivers of the centralization process. It began by examining the general determinants of the operational structure of investment institutions in order to arrive at the specific determinants of the business model of passively managed investment companies. Secondly, it presented the international economic growth of the asset management sector, seeking to understand how the volume of discretionary assets has been distributed internationally and intra-sectorally. Thirdly, it verified the centrality of asset managers in an international structure of institutional shareholdings. From a theoretical perspective, this work will be based on categories from the critique of political economy, especially those of monetary capital, fictitious capital, and fictitious wealth. Furthermore, it was argued that asset managers cannot be understood as mere externalizations of current money trading capital, nor as precise replicas of early 20th-century financial capital. The rise of asset managers has its historical determinants properly rooted in the 21st century. From a technical perspective, the research used bibliographic review and exploratory data analysis in the first and second phases. The third, and final, phase was the inferential stage of the research, whose hypothesis was that BlackRock, the Vanguard group, and State Street were the most central institutional owners in the equity network of the 200 largest non-investing corporations in the world. The hypothesis was tested using Social Network Analysis (SNA) metrics. The metrics of monetary value-weighted degree centrality, pagerank centrality, and institutional control concentration provide evidence to confirm the hypothesis. On the other hand, the total unweighted degree and authority centrality pointed to State Street as the fourth most central institutional owner in the network. Due to these measures, the third most central institutional owner was the newly founded passive fund manager Geode Capital Management, suggesting the emergence of a fourth power to integrate the group of large passive strategy managers. Overall, the network analysis revealed a highly centralized ownership structure of equity capital around the aforementioned managers.
