MSCI Inc.

Retention rates held between 93% and 95% across all four quarters of FY2024 and FY2025, including through the FY2020 COVID market shock. BlackRock's extension of its ETF licensing agreement through 2035 anchors the largest asset-based fee relationship with long contractual duration.

The Index segment represented approximately 56% of FY2024 revenues, with Analytics at 24%, Sustainability and Climate at 11%, and Private Assets at 9%. All four segments serve the same institutional investment management client base, creating material correlation risk in any broad asset management industry downturn.

Subscription run rate as of late 2023 split approximately 45% Americas, 38% EMEA, and 17% Asia Pacific, with active clients in over 100 countries. No single country likely exceeds 40% of revenue, reflecting genuine multi-region diversification uncommon among US-listed financial data companies.

Adjusted EBITDA margin reached approximately 62% in Q4 FY2025, sustained above 55% across multiple consecutive fiscal years, reflecting near-zero marginal cost of adding subscribers to a digital data and index delivery platform. The fixed cost base of index methodology, data infrastructure, and licensing systems scales efficiently as revenue grows.

The majority of MSCI's revenues come from recurring subscription licenses that are mission-critical to institutional fund compliance, performance attribution, and risk reporting. The asset-based fee component (approximately 22% of FY2024 total revenue) is market-linked but governed by long-duration licensing contracts rather than spot transactions.