Concerned About (((BlackRock))) Pricing Out Home Buyers? Wait Until You Hear How Connected They Are To The Government
(dailycaller.com)https://dailycaller.com/2021/07/23/blackrock-housing-market-biden-administration-federal-reserve-finance/Excerpts:
BlackRock gained attention earlier this year after it was reported the asset manager was pricing middle class buyers out of the housing market, but the Wall Street firm has also become an increasingly influential player in the U.S. government.
Institutional investors, primarily banks and asset managers, have been buying up single-family houses to rent in recent years, a business model that could become a dominant force in the housing market and change the nature of home ownership, The Wall Street Journal reported in early June.
Hunter Housing Economics concluded homes that are built to rent account for around 6% of new homes built in the U.S. every year, a number that is expected to double by 2024. Wall Street has also bet billions on the built-to-rent market by investing in home building companies and are projected to put down an additional $40 billion over the next year, according to the WSJ.
BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, has become a prime example of the so-called revolving door between Wall Street and Washington, according to Business Insider. At least three former high-ranking employees of the New York-based firm hold prominent roles in President Joe Biden’s administration.
Biden nominated Brian Deese to serve as director of the National Economic Council (NEC). He previously served as deputy director of both the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the NEC under former President Barack Obama. After his stint in the Obama administration, Deese joined BlackRock as global head of sustainable investing, according to the WSJ.
Jeff Hauser, director of the Revolving Door Project, a group that monitors corporate influence in government, told Reuters in November 2020 that BlackRock’s stake in policy decisions could compel Deese to “be absent from big chunks of his job.”
Biden nominated Adewale Adeyemo to serve as Deputy Secretary of the Treasury. He also worked in the Obama administration first as a senior international economics advisor in the Treasury Department and then as the former president’s deputy national security advisor for international economics. He later joined BlackRock as a senior advisor, according to WSJ.
Vice President Kamala Harris’ chief economic advisor Michael Pyle was formerly the global chief investment strategist at BlackRock, according to Bloomberg. Like his colleagues, Pyle also worked in the Obama administration and served in multiple roles in the NEC, OMB and Treasury Department.
BlackRock has also picked up a number of former U.S. government officials, including those who served in the Obama and Trump administrations as well as at the Federal Reserve.
Thomas Donilon, a former national security advisor to Obama, is now chairman of the asset manager’s research branch. Dalia Blass, a former Securities and Exchange Commission who ran the agency’s asset management division under former President Donald Trump, joined BlackRock in May as head of external affairs.
Coryann Stefansson, a former bank regulator at the Federal Reserve, joined BlackRock as managing director of the firm’s Financial Markets Advisory (FMA) unit in 2016. She left the role in 2019 and now works as a managing director at the financial services firm Citi, according to her LinkedIn.
BlackRock also played a prominent role aiding the Federal Reserve during both the global financial crisis of 2007-2009 and the COVID-19 pandemic last year.
