MSCI

MSCI Inc. (formerly Morgan Stanley Capital International and MSCI Barra), is an American finance company headquartered in New York City and serving as a global provider of equity, fixed income, hedge fund stock market indexes, and multi-asset portfolio analysis tools. It publishes the MSCI BRIC, MSCI World and MSCI EAFE Indexes.

The company is currently headquartered at 7 World Trade Center in Manhattan, New York City, U.S.

History
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 (MSCI) indexes. By the 1980s, the MSCI indexes were the primary benchmark indexes outside of the US 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 from, and perhaps spin off, MSCI. This was followed by an initial public offering of a minority of stock in November 2007. The divestment was completed in 2009. The company is headquartered in New York City.

Some companies in MSCI's peer group includes Glass Lewis, Factset, Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute, and Standard & Poor's.

Acquisitions 

In 2010 MSCI formally acquired RiskMetrics Group, Inc.
and Measurisk.

In 2012 MSCI acquired Investment Property Databank.

In 2013, MSCI acquired Investor Force from ICG Group (formerly Internet Capital Group) in 2013.

In August 2014, MSCI acquired GMI Ratings.

In October 2019, MSCI formally acquired Carbon Delta, a Zurich based climate change analytics company.

Indexes
The MSCI global equity indexes have been calculated since 1969 and include MSCI World and MSCI EAFE. Initially, the company used eight factors in developing its indexes: momentum, volatility, value, size, growth, size nonlinearity, liquidity, and financial leverage.

In 2018 MSCI announced it would begin including mainland Chinese "A" shares in its Emerging Markets Index.  Initially the domestic Chinese companies received a 5% weighting in the index even though the stated methodology called for a 40% weighting.  While MSCI is the last major index provider to include the companies, the decision has proved controversial due to the fact that many Chinese listed companies refuse to permit the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board to inspect their financial records, thereby sparking criticism and questions from Senator Marco Rubio.  In February 2019, The Wall Street Journal reported the decision was the result of pressure from the Chinese government. In March 2019, CNBC reported that MSCI would quadruple the weightings of mainland Chinese shares in its global benchmarks.

References

External links
 

Category:Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange
Category:Financial services companies based in New York City
Category:Publicly traded companies based in New York City
Category:2007 initial public offerings