T. Rowe Price Group reported assets under management of $1.61 trillion at the end of the fourth quarter of 2024, an 11.2% increase from $1.44 trillion a year earlier, but a 1.5% decrease from $1.63 trillion the previous quarter.
Net client outflows totaled $19.3 billion for the fourth quarter and $43.2 billion for the full year of 2024. That’s down from net outflows of $81.8 billion for full year 2023.
CEO and president Rob Sharps pointed to outflows being “reduced by nearly half year over year.” He said in the earnings release that he is “optimistic that we remain on the path to positive flows, and we are on pace to further reduce outflows again this year.”
Multi-asset products saw $15.5 billion in net outflows during the fourth quarter followed by equities strategies with $8.2 billion. Fixed income, including money market products, and alternatives both saw inflows of $3.5 billion and $900 million, respectively.
By client type, institutional investors accounted for $4.9 billion in net inflows during the fourth quarter while retail investors made up $24.2 billion in net outflows, according to a supplemental earnings release.
During the firm's earnings call, Sharps pointed to growth in the firm’s ETF business which closed the year with nearly $8 billion in assets and 17 ETFs, with 13 ETFs now scaled at or over $100 million in assets under management. He also pointed to growth in the insurance channel and the extension of its target date fund franchise into Canada.
Earlier this week, T. Rowe along with its alternative credit subsidiary Oak Hill Advisors announced a strategic partnership with life insurance and annuity firm Aspida Holdings, which is owned by Ares Management's Ares Insurance Solutions business.
“Working with Aspida will allow us to refine our insurance asset management offering, particularly in the life and annuity space, which should create additional opportunity with other insurers,” Sharps said during the firm’s earnings call. “In time, we’ve also discussed evaluating, co-developing some investment offerings with a Aspida and potentially with Ares.”
Asked during the call about the possibility of alternatives entering into retirement offerings, head of global investments and CIO Eric Veiel said the firm is “fully in favor of anything that leads to better client outcomes, and our research is going deep into what asset classes like private credit could do to improve the risk return equation for different participants within that (defined contribution) channel.”
“We have been engaging with clients and consultants and our investment team on this, obviously, to date, a lot of the activity has been more on the custom side, but we think it's increasingly likely that there'll be an opportunity to broaden that discussion out into more standard offerings,” Veiel said.
