Finance

Major banks and fund managers from JPMorgan Chase to BlackRock are creating more ETF products that tap into areas of the market typically associated with private banking and reserved for high-net-worth clients, such as private credit.
Main Street investors are seeking new ways to insulate their money and grow it at the same time, which has led to more asset flows into premium income and buffered equity trading strategies in an ETF wrapper.

From America’s largest bank to its biggest asset manager, Wall Street investment strategies once reserved for private banking clients are increasingly being offered to Main Street investors.
In the midst of a market correction and ongoing uncertainty about the outlook for U.S. stocks and the global economy, JPMorgan Chase and BlackRock are among major players in the ETF space making bets that private strategies will continue to see greater adoption. That includes private credit as a mainstream bond portfolio holding, as well as equity income strategies that involved more complicated trading than traditional dividend equity funds.

“Across our business we are looking at an incredible amount of demand from ETF investors who are looking for access to alternative investment funds, and we find managers are looking to push more into that wealth space to tap into growth to meet investors where they are,” Ben Slavin, managing director and global head of BNY Mellon ETF business, told CNBC’s Bob Pisani on last week’s “ETF Edge” from the Exchange ETF Conference in Las Vegas.
“While mutual funds still make a ton of sense for retirement accounts, interval funds have been really successful in allowing for access to private credit,” Jay Jacobs, head of BlackRock’s US Thematic and Active ETF business, told Pisani from the conference. He was referring to a form of closed-end fund that has existed for a long time, and in which investors can access private credit, albeit with less liquidity than in an ETF.
BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager and biggest issuer of ETFs, acquired a provider of alternative investments research last year, Preqin, and Jacobs said the firm plans “more indexing of private investments.”
The SEC recently approved the first private credit ETF, though not without some controversy.
Lack of liquidity in private markets is a key issue for ETFs to solve as they attempt to grow the alternative investment side of the business. These kinds of funds, like Van Eck’s BDC Income ETF — which invests in business development companies that make private loans to small and mid-sized companies — have traditionally been illiquid but because of innovation in the ETF industry, more people are gaining access. 

Another trend that is catching on within the ETF market amid the current volatility in stocks is active ETFs designed to offer downside protection while capitalizing on income gained from selling call options. ETFs including the JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF (JEPI) and JPMorgan Nasdaq Equity Premium Income ETF (JEPQ) use this approach.
Goldman Sachs Asset Management’s Bryon Lake said on a recent “ETF Edge” — he was among the leaders of the JPMorgan ETF business when JEPI was created and now runs a similar strategy at Goldman — “You sell that call, you get the premium for that, and then you can pay that out as income. As we look at this space, that’s one category that’s been evergreen for investors. A lot of investors are looking for income on a consistent basis.”

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Funds like JEPI give investors exposure to sell call strategies.

“There’s multiple ways to win with a strategy like this, as you can remain invested in the equity side and get the return, and capture that premium income which adds to a growing need and growing desire for income across all asset classes, and that’s a really effective way to stay in the market,” Travis Spence, head of JPMorgan Asset Management’s global ETFs business, said on last week’s “ETF Edge.”
The expense ratio on the JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF is 0.35 percent, with a 7.2 percent dividend. The firm also offers the JPMorgan Nasdaq Equity Premium Income ETF with the same expense ratio, but with a dividend yield right now of 10.6 percent. “Its an effective trade off in a choppy market,” Spence said.
Thirty years ago, an investor would have had to be a high-end client of a Wall Street private bank that would customize a portfolio in order to participate in the options fund strategy, said Ben Johnson, Morningstar’s head of client solutions and asset management. But now, “ETFs make it easier and cheaper to implement these strategies,” he said.
Buffer ETFs run by Goldman and others, which cap both market upside and downside as a way to mitigate volatility in returns, are also gaining in popularity.
“Clearly, when you look at the flows, there is demand for these products,” Slavin said. “Until recently, it was not really well known,” he added.
The premium income and buffer ETFs can offer investors a way to stay in the market rather than run from it. But in a market that has seen steep declines of late, Jacobs says these strategies also offer a way for investors to get into the market with less fear of quickly losing money. That’s an important point, he said, with trillions of dollars sitting in money market accounts. “A lot of investors are using buffered products to step out of cash and into the market,” he said. “No one wants to be the one who held cash for five years and just put their money into the market and watched it sell off 10%.”
After watching the S&P 500 already lose more than 10% of its value in a three-week period this month, ETF strategies designed to offer protection are getting more attention from advisors and their clients. But Johnson says investors should remember that there is nothing “new” about these investment strategies that have been used on Wall Street for decades, and investors need to weigh both the pros and cons of wrapping them in an ETF structure.
Private credit ETFs are a good example, he said, since interval funds that trade under ticker symbols are already available, albeit in a less liquid trading format. ETFs have structural advantages to offer — an inexpensive way to gain access to what have long been “really expensive, super illiquid investments,” he said. But on the other side, to be approved by the SEC, the ETFs need to “water down a lot of what investors want,” he added.
Nevertheless, Johnson thinks it may just be a matter of time before private credit ETFs are standard. “I think back to bank loans, circa 2011,” he said, when many “balked at ever wrapping it in an ETF. But now that seems fairly common place.” More

EVEN HIS most ardent detractors would grant that Donald Trump is a masterful marketer. So it goes for the barrage of tariffs that he is set to unveil on April 2nd. The president has promised they will mark “Liberation Day” for America—a turning point when the country starts to claw back the respect and money that, he thinks, it has lost over the decades. More

An expired patent — previously held by Vanguard — may spark a shake-up in the exchange-traded fund industry.
Wall Street saw the patent as critical to Vanguard’s success because it saved an enormous amount of money in taxes. Now, the firm’s ETF competitors could get a chance to use it, too.

“It’s really a game changer,” BNY Mellon’s global head of ETFs’ Ben Slavin told CNBC’s “ETF Edge” this week.
Vanguard’s patent expired in 2023. How it works: Investors can access the same portfolio of stocks through two different formats: a mutual fund and an ETF. The portfolio has the same managers and the same holdings. “ETF Edge” host Bob Pisani notes the advantage is that it reduces taxable events in a (shared) portfolio.
Ben Johnson of Morningstar contends the structure could help millions of investors reduce tax burdens. His research firm describes it as a way for ETFs to exist as a separate share class within a mutual fund.
“ETF share classes appended to the mutual fund would help improve the tax efficiency of the fund to the benefit of everybody,” said Johnson, the firm’s head of client solutions.
It will ultimately come down to approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“My thesis has been that it’s a matter of when, and not if,” said Johnson, who added the ETF industry thinks it could happen as soon as this summer.

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A federal judge on Friday ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s leadership, appointed by President Donald Trump, to halt its campaign to hobble the agency.
Berman ordered Vought to reinstate all probationary and term employees fired after Vought took over at the CFPB, said that he shouldn’t “delete, destroy, remove, or impair agency data,” and struck down Vought’s February stop-work order.
“To ensure that employees can perform their statutorily mandated functions, the defendants must provide them with either fully-equipped office space, or permission to work remotely” Berman wrote.

FILE PHOTO: Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Acting Director Russell Vought testifies before House Budget Committee on 2020 Budget on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., March 12, 2019. 
Yuri Gripas | Reuters

A federal judge on Friday ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s leadership, appointed by President Donald Trump, to halt its campaign to dismantle the agency.
In a filing, Judge Amy Berman Jackson sided with the CFPB employee union that sued acting director Russell Vought last month to prevent him from laying off nearly all the regulator’s staff. Operatives from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have also been involved in efforts to fire employees.

“Defendants shall not terminate any CFPB employee, except for cause related to the individual employee’s performance or conduct; and defendants shall not issue any notice of reduction-in-force to any CFPB employee,” Berman said.
The order is the latest example in which a federal judge has pushed back against moves by the Trump administration to lay off federal employees and hobble disfavored agencies. It breathes new life into the only federal agency tasked specifically with consumer protection of nonbank financial players, but one that the industry has accused of operating outside its authority under former director Rohit Chopra.
Berman ordered Vought to reinstate all probationary and term employees fired after Vought took over at the CFPB, said that he shouldn’t “delete, destroy, remove, or impair agency data,” and struck down Vought’s February stop-work order.
“To ensure that employees can perform their statutorily mandated functions, the defendants must provide them with either fully-equipped office space, or permission to work remotely” Berman wrote.
In the sweeping document, Berman also said that the CFPB needed to ensure its consumer complaint portal worked and it responded to those complaints; told the CFPB to reverse contract terminations undertaken by Vought, and ordered him to file a report by April 4 confirming compliance with the edicts.

She specifically said the order applied to all CFPB leaders as well as “any other persons who are in active concert or participation with them, such as personnel from the Department of Government Efficiency.”
A spokesperson for Vought didn’t immediately return an email seeking comment.

‘Cannot look away’

In a separate, 112-page opinion that cited Musk’s Feb. 7 social media post declaring “CFPB RIP,” Berman explained her rationale in granting the union’s request for a preliminary injunction.
“The Court cannot look away or the CFPB will be dissolved and dismantled completely in approximately thirty days, well before this lawsuit has come to its conclusion,” she wrote.
The injunction “maintains the agency’s existence until this case has been resolved on the merits, reinstating and preserving the agency’s contracts, work force, data, and operational capacity, and protecting and facilitating the employees’ ability to perform statutorily required activities,” she wrote. More

Charlie Javice, founder of a startup purchased by JPMorgan Chase in 2021, was convicted in federal court Friday of defrauding the bank by vastly overstating the company’s customer list.
The jury decision comes after weeks of testimony in New York over who was to blame for the flameout of a once-promising startup. Frank, founded by Javice in 2016, aimed to help users apply for college financial aid.
JPMorgan has accused Javice, 32, of duping the bank into paying $175 million for a company that had more than 4 million customers, when in reality it had fewer than 300,000.

Charlie Javice, who is charged with defrauding JPMorgan Chase & Co into buying her now-shuttered college financial aid startup Frank for $175 million in 2021, arrives at United States Court in Manhattan in New York City, June 6, 2023.
Mike Segar | Reuters

Charlie Javice, founder of a startup purchased by JPMorgan Chase in 2021, was convicted in federal court Friday of defrauding the bank by vastly overstating the company’s customer list.
The jury decision comes after weeks of testimony in New York over who was to blame for the flameout of a once-promising startup. Frank, founded by Javice in 2016, aimed to help users apply for college financial aid.

JPMorgan has accused Javice, 32, of duping the bank into paying $175 million for a company that had more than 4 million customers, when in reality it had fewer than 300,000.
The largest U.S. bank by assets sued Javice in late 2022 after attempting to send marketing emails to some of the thousands of “customers” it thought Frank had. In its suit, JPMorgan released emails in which Javice hired a data scientist to generate a fake roster of customers.
Then, in April 2023, the Justice Department charged Javice with four crimes including wire and bank fraud, counts which carry multi-decade maximum sentences. Javice was arrested at Newark Airport on April 3 of that year and had been out on bail.
Javice had pleaded not guilty and said she was innocent throughout the trial; her lawyers blamed JPMorgan for rushing to close the Frank acquisition because it feared that other suitors would emerge.
Sentencing will happen in August, CNBC’s Leslie Picker reported.
A spokesman for New York-based JPMorgan declined to comment on Friday, while the office of a lawyer representing Javice didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment. More

Chinese President Xi Jinping met with foreign executives on Friday in Beijing and emphasized that the country was a safe and stable place for companies. 
Business leaders Xi met included Bridgewater Associates’ Ray Dalio, Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters and Blackstone Group CEO Steve Schwartzman.
“To invest in China is to invest in tomorrow,” Xi said in Mandarin translated by CNBC. 

Chinese President Xi Jinping met with global executives on Friday, March 28, 2025.
CNBC | Evelyn Cheng

BEIJING — Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday met with global executives and made a case for investing in the country, as Beijing focuses on reaching out to businesses amid escalating trade tensions with the U.S.
He said multinational companies had a big responsibility to “uphold global order” and that they needed to work hand in hand with China.

Xi emphasized that China was a safe and stable place for foreign companies. “To invest in China is to invest in tomorrow,” he said in Mandarin translated by CNBC. 
Echoing recent policy plans, Xi said that China would ensure fair opportunities for foreign businesses to participate in government procurement bids.
More than 40 people, mostly foreign executives and business officials, attended the roundtable meeting with Xi, including Bridgewater Associates’ Ray Dalio, Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters and Blackstone Group CEO Steve Schwartzman.
U.S. President Donald Trump has raised tariffs by 20% on China since January over its alleged role in the U.S. fentanyl crisis, and threatened a swath of new duties on major trading partners starting early April. Trump this week said he might reduce China tariffs to help close a deal that forces Beijing-based ByteDance to sell TikTok’s U.S. operations.
The U.S. this week also added dozens of Chinese tech companies to its export blacklist, the first such restrictions under the Trump administration.

China has increased its trade with Southeast Asian countries and the European Union, but the U.S. remains Beijing’s largest trading partner on a single-country basis.
Xi said U.S.-China trade tensions should be resolved through negotiations. “We need to work for the stability of global supply chains,” he added, noting there was no way out under decoupling.
Politburo standing committee member Cai Qi, China’s top diplomat Wang Yi and Vice Premier He Lifeng also attended the meeting along with the heads of China’s economic planning agency, finance ministry and commerce ministry.
Seven foreign executives spoke at the event before Xi gave closing remarks, according to an agenda seen by CNBC.
Xi gave individualized comments on the speaker’s remarks based on past history with the person or the company, according to Stephen Orlins, president of the National Committee on US-China Relations.
Orlins pointed out that the companies present at the meeting already had interests in China.
Beijing has sought to offset trade pressures, rather than retaliate forcefully. It courted the executives of major U.S. businesses at a state-backed annual conference that ran from Sunday to Monday. Apple CEO Tim Cook was among those who attended the conference, while Tesla CEO Elon Musk was conspicuous by his absence. Neither were at Friday’s meeting with Xi.
Also on Sunday, U.S. Republican Senator Steve Daines met Chinese Premier Li Qiang in Beijing — the first time a U.S. politician has visited China since Trump began his latest term in January.
“This was the first step to an important next step, which will be a meeting between President Xi and President Trump,” Daines told the Wall Street Journal. “When that occurs and where it occurs is to be determined.”
The White House did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
Li urged cooperation and said no one could gain from a trade war, according to state media.
Top executives of major firms including FedEx, Pfizer, Cargill, Qualcomm and Boeing as well as U.S.-China Business Council President Sean Stein were also present at Daines’ meeting with Li, according to a foreign media pool report. More

In the latest step towards building a revenue-generating robotaxi business, Chinese startup Pony.ai said it has obtained the first permit to charge fares for fully driverless taxis in core parts of a business district of Shenzhen.
The permit allows Pony.ai to charge fares for rides — without any human staff inside — from the Shenzhen international airport and Shenzhen Bay Port to key parts of the district of Nanshan, home to tech giants Tencent and DJI.
While Pony.ai did not disclose how many robotaxis it could operate in the region, the company said the driverless cars could run daily from 7:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. local time.

A Pony.ai robotaxi drives on a public road in a suburb in southern Beijing on July 11, 2024.
China News Service | China News Service | Getty Images

BEIJING — In the latest step toward building a revenue-generating robotaxi business, Chinese start-up Pony.ai said it has obtained China’s first permit to charge fares for fully driverless taxis in core parts of a business district of Shenzhen.
The city is a coastal tech hub in southern China, sometimes dubbed the country’s Silicon Valley.

The license allows Pony.ai to charge fares for rides — without any human staff inside — in key parts of the district of Nanshan, home to tech giants Tencent and DJI. The permit does not cover trips across the entire space, limiting it to areas such as the financial sub-district.
Pony.ai has already operated robotaxis in parts of a neighboring Shenzhen district and can run taxis with human staff inside on routes that connect to the Shenzhen international airport and Shenzhen Bay Checkpoint on the border with Hong Kong.
While Pony.ai did not disclose how many robotaxis it could operate in the Shenzhen region, the company said the driverless cars could run daily from 7:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. local time.
Residents can book the robotaxi rides through Pony.ai’s app or a mini-program inside the WeChat messaging app, according to a press release.

Pony.ai also operates robotaxis in parts of the major Chinese cities of Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, for a total of more than 250 cars across the country as of late November.

In late 2021, local authorities in Beijing started allowing Baidu’s Apollo Go and Pony.ai to charge fares for robotaxis in a southern suburb of the city.
In mid-March, Pony.ai also said it was the first company to launch a paid robotaxi route from the suburb to Beijing South Railway Station. Users must reserve the ride a day in advance, and a human staff worker must sit in the driver’s seat, according to current regulations.
Pony.ai this week reported “a significant increase” in passenger fares in the fourth quarter from a year ago, without disclosing exact figures. But the company said its overall revenue from robotaxi services fell by nearly 61.9% year-on-year to $2.6 million in the fourth quarter due to reduced service fees for autonomous vehicle engineering solutions. It also noted its revenue from robotruck services rose by 72.7% year-on-year to $12.9 million due to the expansion of its robotruck fleet. More

Traders work at the post where GameStop is traded on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange on June 12, 2024.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters

GameStop shares are set to give back much of Wednesday’s rally after the video game retailer announced plans to raise debt to buy bitcoin.
The meme stock tumbled more than 7% in premarket trading Thursday, following an almost 12% rally the previous session. The reversal came after the video game chain announced plans to raise $1.3 billion through the sale of convertible senior notes due in 2030 to buy bitcoin.

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On Tuesday, the GameStop board unanimously approved a plan to buy cryptocurrencies using corporate cash or future debt and equity proceeds, echoing a move made famous by MicroStrategy.
Under the latest sale, a round of convertible debt will require issuing 46 million additional shares of GameStop, bringing the company’s cash to $6.1 billion, up from about $4.8 billion, according to Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter.
“We suspect that GameStop’s share price will drift lower prior to the issuance of the convert, particularly given that a convert investor will receive a zero coupon and will be required to have faith that the GameStop meme phenomenon will persist for another five years,” Pachter, who has an underperform rating on GameStop, said in a note to clients.
The analyst is doubtful that GameStop’s foray into bitcoin following MicroStrategy’s playbook will be as successful because of the stock’s already-high valuation.
GameStop is currently valued at $12.7 billion, more than twice the cash balance after the convertible is issued. By contrast, MicroStrategy trades at less than two times the value of its bitcoin holdings.

“With GameStop already trading at more than 2x its cash holdings it is unlikely that its conversion of cash into Bitcoin will drive an even greater premium,” Pachter said.
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