What happened with MSCI today?
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MSCI’s largest business is licensing indexes that investors use to build portfolios, compare performance and create index-linked funds and other financial products. Indexes generate most of its revenue, with annual subscriptions providing the majority of index revenue. Product providers also pay fees tied to the assets or trading volumes of products linked to MSCI indexes.
Beyond indexes, investors pay for tools that analyze portfolio risk and explain investment performance. Analytics is its next-largest business. MSCI also sells sustainability and climate research and ratings, and private-market data that help investors assess holdings, compare returns and prepare reports. Most company revenue comes from recurring subscriptions.
The business depends on clients renewing those subscriptions and continuing to use MSCI indexes. Fees tied to investment products move with market values, investor inflows and outflows, and trading activity. BlackRock is its largest client; nearly all revenue from BlackRock comes from asset-based fees on funds and other products linked to MSCI indexes. MSCI also needs continued access to third-party data, including stock-exchange data used to construct indexes.
Benchmark regulation governs parts of its index business and can restrict where indexes may be offered. EU rules require ESG-ratings providers to obtain authorization and supervision from the European Securities and Markets Authority; MSCI expects certain sustainability and climate products to fall within those rules.
The risk section is the longest, dullest part of the filing. This keeps only what can really hurt you: where it hits, how hard, when it plays out.
Every company claims an edge. Each one is checked against hard numbers like margins and returns: which hold, and which line gives way first.
MSCI depends on institutional spending on data and assets in index-linked products, with FTSE Russell and Bloomberg important competitors missing from this list.
S&P Global competes with MSCI for investment clients buying indexes, data and analytics, but also helps maintain the industry classifications investors use to organize portfolios—the GICS standard. Its S&P Dow Jones Indices business is both an index rival and MSCI’s partner in that standard, which MSCI licenses as GICS Direct.
BlackRock pays MSCI to use its indexes in investment funds and was its largest client, providing 10.8% of revenue in 2025, while its Aladdin and BlackRock Solutions offerings compete with MSCI’s investment analytics. Watch assets in BlackRock’s MSCI-linked ETFs and non-ETF products: asset-based fees supplied 96.5% of MSCI’s revenue from BlackRock that year.
FactSet competes with MSCI for subscriptions that help investment professionals analyze portfolios, measure performance and risk, and prepare reports. Its portfolio-analytics and managed-services business is the part to watch for competition with MSCI’s risk tools and reporting services.
Morningstar competes with MSCI for investors’ spending on investment data, platforms and indexes, as well as sustainability research through Sustainalytics and private-market data through PitchBook. Its research, data and platform subscriptions are worth watching: they generated 70.3% of Morningstar’s revenue in 2025.
Nasdaq competes with MSCI by licensing investment indexes and selling market data to investors and financial firms, but also runs exchanges and sells financial technology. Its Index and Data businesses are the parts to watch for MSCI, rather than its trading and clearing operations.
Moody’s Analytics competes with MSCI’s credit-risk data and analytical tools, selling data and subscription software for banking and insurance workflows. Watch that business rather than Moody’s debt ratings, which depend more on debt issuance than MSCI’s recurring subscriptions and index fees.
Intercontinental Exchange competes with MSCI in providing fixed-income indexes and investment data and analytics to financial customers. Exchanges and mortgage technology account for much of ICE’s business, so its overall results are a less direct comparison for MSCI.
SS&C Technologies Inc competes with MSCI for clients paying to measure portfolio performance and risk and produce investment reports, alongside its broader fund-administration and accounting services. Watch its analytics and reporting offerings within its software subscriptions and outsourced services, rather than treating all of SS&C’s revenue as competing with MSCI.
MSCI, Inc. earningsThis company
MSCI’s report will show whether client renewals are still growing subscription revenue, and whether fees tied to assets in MSCI-linked products add to that growth.
Read subscription growth alongside the retention rate, then compare asset-based fees. Growing subscriptions with retention near 94.4%, MSCI’s 2025 rate, would show clients are still renewing its data, analytics and index licenses; slower subscriptions or lower retention would weaken confidence in that steadier revenue base. Growth in asset-based fees as well would show markets and client assets adding to revenue; a decline would make MSCI’s exposure to market movements more apparent.
Moody's Corporation earningsMCO
Moody’s Analytics results will show how banks’ and insurers’ demand for credit-risk data and subscription tools is changing, in a market where its offerings compete with MSCI’s analytics.
Watch Moody’s Analytics data and subscription software, not its debt-rating business. Growth would show banks and insurers still paying for credit-risk data and workflow tools, sustaining both customer demand and competition for MSCI’s related analytics. Weakness could mean those clients are cutting budgets or turning to alternatives, making the market harder for MSCI too, but it would not prove MSCI’s own sales are falling.
Nasdaq, Inc. earningsNDAQ
Nasdaq’s Index and Data businesses will show whether investors and financial firms are still buying the licensed indexes and market data that compete with MSCI’s offerings.
Focus on Nasdaq’s Index and Data businesses, not its exchange and clearing operations. Growth there would show investors and financial firms are still buying licensed indexes and market data, keeping competition for the same clients and budgets active for MSCI. Weakness would point to pressure on demand or spending in that market; it could ease competitive pressure on MSCI, but could also signal a softer market overall.
Fed Interest Rate Decision
MSCI’s Fed-rate exposure is mainly the $300 million drawn on its variable-rate credit facility: policy rates help determine what MSCI pays to borrow, while its fixed-coupon notes are not directly repriced.
Expected4.0%Last release4.0%
If it comes in above expectations
If the Fed sets rates higher than expected, interest on MSCI’s variable-rate borrowing may rise, increasing financing costs and reducing what remains from its revenue for other uses.
If it comes in below expectations
If the Fed sets rates lower than expected, interest on MSCI’s variable-rate borrowing may fall, easing financing costs and leaving more of its revenue available for other uses.
