MSCI

MSCI Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides investment decision support tools for clients to manage their investment processes worldwide. It operates through four segments: Index, Analytics, ESG and Climate, and All Private Assets. The Index segment provides indexes for use in various areas of the investment process, including indexed product creation, such as ETFs, mutual funds, annuities, futures, options, structured products, over-the-counter derivatives; performance benchmarking; portfolio construction and rebalancing; and asset allocation, as well as licenses GICS and GICS Direct. 

The Analytics segment offers risk management, performance attribution and portfolio management content, application, and service that provides an integrated view of risk and return, and an analysis of the market, credit, liquidity, and counterparty risk across asset classes; managed services, including consolidation of client portfolio data from various sources, review and reconciliation of input data and results, and customized reporting; and HedgePlatform to measure, evaluate, and monitor the risk of hedge fund investments. 

The ESG and Climate segment provides products and services that help institutional investors understand how ESG factors impact the long-term risk and return of their portfolio and individual security-level investments; and data, ratings, research, and tools to help investors navigate increasing regulation. 

The private Assets segment includes real estate market and transaction data, benchmarks, return analytics, climate assessments and market insights for funds, investors, and managers; business intelligence to real estate owners, managers, developers, and brokers; and offers investment decision support tools for private capital. It serves asset owners and managers, financial intermediaries, wealth managers, real estate professionals, and corporates. MSCI Inc. was incorporated in 1998 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

In 1968, Capital International published indexes covering the global stock market for non-U.S. markets. In 1986, Morgan Stanley licensed the rights to the indexes from Capital International and branded the indexes as the Morgan Stanley Capital International indexes. By the 1980s, the MSCI indexes were the primary benchmark indexes outside of the U.S. before being joined by FTSE, Citibank, and Standard & Poor's. After Dow Jones started float-weighting its index funds, MSCI followed. 

In 2004, MSCI acquired Barra, Inc., to form MSCI Barra. In mid-2007, parent company Morgan Stanley decided to divest MSCI. This was followed by an initial public offering of a minority of stock in November of that year. The divestment was completed in 2009. The company is headquartered in New York City. Some companies in MSCI's peer group include Glass Lewis, Factset, Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute, and Standard & Poor's.

In 2010 MSCI acquired RiskMetrics Group, Inc. and Measures. Two years later, MSCI acquired Investment Property Databank. In 2013, MSCI acquired Investor Force from ICG Group. In August next year, MSCI acquired GMI Ratings. In October 2019, MSCI acquired Carbon Delta, a Zurich-based climate change analytics company. In September 2021, MSCI acquired Real Capital Analytics.

In October 2021, MSCI and Cboe Global Markets signed a licensing agreement that would see MSCI grow its options product suite and allow them to work on other projects as well. In April 2022, MSCI entered into a collaboration with MarketAxess on fixed income indices, portfolio construction solutions, and ESG data, using MSCI's ESG data and MarketAxess' pricing and liquidity indicators.

“We strive to bring greater transparency to financial markets, enabling the investment community to make better decisions for a better world.”

“We are committed to the future sustainability and transparency of the financial markets. We create innovative products and services that allow our clients to make more informed investment decisions. We provide investors with critical performance measurement and risk management data and analytics.”