This week, we interviewed Samara Cohen, Chief Investment Officer of ETF and Index Investing blackstone. Her team manages more than $6 trillion in ETFs An index of $10 trillion in assets under management by BlackRock.

She discussed how she took a position on the BlackRock trading floor before entering Goldman. After 14 years, she returned to BlackRock.

Cohen observes, “At BlackRock, there is absolutely nothing passive about index investing.” She prefers the term “index” to “passive” to describe the way they manage their portfolios. It’s not just a simple list of stocks, ensuring ETF market quality, trading robustness, and resilience against volatility and market stress is critical. BlackRock leverages its scale to create the liquidity and robustness that have proved its worth during the recent market turmoil.

We also discussed some of the more fascinating roles in her department: Portfolio Engineer, Risk Manager, Platform Architect, Market Structure Developer, and Product Operating Model Designer all make ETFs work.

Her Favorite Book List here; our conversation transcript is available here on Monday.

You can stream and download our full conversations, including podcast add-ons iTunes, Spotify, stapler, Google, Bloombergand Akaster. All early podcasts on your favorite podcast host are available find here.

Be sure to check out our Master of Business Next week with Bill Gross, co-founder of PIMCO, who manages the Total Return Fund, the largest mutual fund in the world with a total return of $293B. Gross advised the Treasury on the role of subprime mortgage bonds and was named Morningstar’s ten-year fund manager in 2010.His new book is I’m Still Standing: Bond King Bill Gross and PIMCO Express.

samara cohen’s favorite book

Digital Body Language: How to Build Trust and Connection, Regardless of Distance Erica Davan

loud girl Abby Dare

My Full Life: Work, Family and Our Future By Indra Nooyi

book mentioned by barry

Trillions: How a group of Wall Street traitors invented index funds and changed finance forever by Robin Wiggsworth

Windfall: A booming business on global warming Mackenzie Fink